Entrapment
by Victoria Hughes
Summary: EPILOGUE UP. In a world where Clockwork didn't save Danny's friends and family, Danny struggles to keep from turning into his evil future self. But Vlad isn't helping ... alternate timelines, evil futures, and two Dannys? TUE Based. DxS & DxV.
1. Entrapment

**Chapter 1: Entrapment**

_It is always a risk to fool with time, and Clockwork knows this. But he is confident, he will be confident, he was confident. Time is his playground._

_And so it is, it was, it will be, nothing of great concern to him to interfere in Daniel Fenton's future._

_He knows he can – has – will control the alternate timelines interference creates._

_And so he does._

"Clockwork."

_Observers, _Clockwork thought disgustedly. "What do you want?" he demanded, his eyes not leaving the worlds he was observing.

"It has come to our attention that you interfered with Time not once, but twice," said one of the ghosts. "We have …"

"An alternate timeline," finished the other Observer. "True, you have eliminated the Future Daniel Phantom from Time, but there is now another—"

"I know," Clockwork shot back. "Do you think I do not know? I am the Master of Time, and I am aware of its fluctuations!" He waved a hand, and another portal appeared, to another world and time – where the remains of the Nasty Burger smoked dangerously, and Daniel Fenton was on his hands and knees, gaping in horror. "It is this timeline you are referring to?"

"Why did you interfere a second time?" hissed one Observer. "This alternate timeline—"

"Is an expected and calculated result of my meddling," Clockwork interrupted. "And I realize your worries that Phantom may come to exist again in this time, but I am confident." He smiled, looking back into the room where the Fenton Thermos containing the apparition stood. "As long as I can hear him screaming for release, there is nothing to be concerned about." He eyed the Observers. "Or would you have preferred that I not have interfered and _your_ timeline, the True timeline, possibly become infested with what you demanded I eliminate?"

The Observers looked at each other, then back at Clockwork silently.

Clockwork smirked at them. "No human is so important that their lives can ruin Time forevermore," he informed the ghosts. "Not even Daniel. It may take a thousand years, but his influence will fade, and this timeline will merge with the True one. And I will watch over it – as I always have – and make sure it is so." He paused. "Do you doubt my abilities? After you charged me with this job?"

"You should have simply destroyed Daniel instead of creating this chronological mess," one Observer shot back.

"Ah, I see." Clockwork turned away. "You truly think the world would have been a better place if I had done that? You would be wrong." He raised his chin. "But I am not obligated to prove myself to you. Don't you have better things to watch, children? Such as your precious timeline?"

The Observers glared at Clockwork's back, but they slunk away.

Clockwork smiled thinly. "Daniel," he said softly. "I believe that it may very well be your own self that keeps you from the darker path."

_When Clockwork steps in – stepped in – will step in and saves Daniel's friends and family, Time splits, as it always does/did/will do when Clockwork interferes._

_And in another time, another place, Clockwork never saves Daniel's friends and family._

_And Time marches on._

* * *

"Danny? Danny? Are you hurt? Are you okay?"

_Dumb question_, Daniel thought. _What a dumb question._ "'m fine," he heard himself say, but he didn't look up at Valerie. He just stared at the place where the Nasty Burger had once stood, speechless.

_It's not fair. It's not fair! I didn't cheat, my future self cheated for me! I just … I …_

_I just wasn't fast enough._

_Mom … Dad … Jazz … my best friends …_

He could hear sirens pulling up, saw paramedics and fire fighters flooding the scene. Hands grabbed him, hauling him off the ground and towards an ambulance. "One teenage boy, superficial wounding, possible burns and internal injuries. Looks like he was thrown clear of the explosion," someone said over his head. "Kid, look at me. Kid, are you okay?"

"Dumb question," Danny mumbled, still staring at the wreckage.

"Doesn't look like we have any other survivors," one paramedic announced as he jogged up. "Just him." He looked down at Danny; Danny didn't look back. "Can you tell us what happened?" he asked softly.

"Explosion," Daniel croaked. "M-my family was …"

"Oh no. Poor kid," the paramedic sympathized. Danny had the urge to punch him in the face, but he didn't have the energy to do so. He felt like he could just melt into the ground and never come back. Felt like there was no reason at all to keep on existing.

This was what he'd been trying to stop, and he'd _failed._ What was the point of …?

"Daniel Fenton, age 14," someone said, and then he was being pushed down onto a stretcher. "Kid's the only survivor. Let's get him to the hospital and make sure he checks out."

The doors of the ambulance shut behind him, and Daniel debated the merits of just going intangible and flying away, running from everything. In the end, he didn't do anything except lay there. Useless … like he should have always known he was.

He never really missed the Fenton Thermos. In fact, the Thermos had disappeared from the timeline at the exact moment of the timeline split and into Clockwork's lair.

And the future Phantom fumed, but fumed with pride. He still existed.

Danny's future was sealed.

* * *

Danny drifted through the next week, feeling mostly just numb. The hospital determined the wounds were completely superficial (if the future!Phantom had done any damage worthy of note, it had healed long before Danny got through the tests at the hospital) and he was free to go. But go where?

No one was sure, for hours on end. Sam and Tucker's parents were, of course, devastated, Mr. and Mrs. Manson bawling when they arrived at the hospital and Mrs. Foley sniffling quietly, her eyes full of tears, while Mr. Foley held her and visibly tried not to cry too.

Daniel tried to tell them something – anything – but nothing would come.

He didn't even know if there was anything left of them to collect, and a cold pit of despair formed in his stomach and wouldn't go away.

He ended up at the Foley's house for the night and spent most of it sitting on Tucker's bed, silent.

What was the appropriate grieving time for a whole family and two best friends? But the worst part, Danny thought disgustedly, was that he couldn't even manage to cry. All he felt was sick. Utterly revolted by himself. And sometimes, he felt furious, wanting to do nothing more than destroy something. The fury scared him.

He didn't go ghost once the whole week. He also barely strung three words together, picked at his food (but no one in the Foley household had much of an appetite), and generally avoided everyone, hiding in the guest room.

It _was_ his fault, after all. No one would ever know it had been his fault; no one knew his future self had come to the past, no one knew it was his future self that had ensured Danny's family and friends would be at the Nasty Burger and blown up, and no one knew that Danny had taken so long to fight his future Phantom that he hadn't been able to save them. But Danny knew, and it was killing him slowly.

And he worried.

The future Phantom had been certain the turning point of his life was Danny cheating on the C.A.T., but Danny knew the final event that had created him was still in the future – the combining of his ghost half with Vlad's ghost half. Vlad had told him about the despair that had driven him to want to separate himself from his ghost powers.

Danny was drowning in that despair, no matter how desperately he tried to claw his way out of it. He wanted to stop feeling – or not-feeling, cold and sick all the time. People talked about how they got past their grief, even if they never stopped feeling loss, but had any of _them _had their whole family and two best friends in the whole world killed in one fell swoop? How could he possibly get past this on his own?

He didn't know how, and it scared him to the core.

Relatives started showing up two days after everything, though, relatives Danny hadn't even known he'd had, second cousins and great aunts and uncles twice-removed. It was a little unnerving, and a lot weird. How did all these people, who his parents had known for 14 years of his life, suddenly show up when his parents were dead? But it was Aunt Dani who stepped up to the plate (half-bawling) and took care of the funeral arrangements. She also offered – well, more like demanded – that Danny stay with her in her hotel room.

It was a relief to get away from the Foley's house, Danny had to admit. He didn't think he could take Mrs. Foley bursting into tears at the sight of him any more.

The triple funeral for Danny's family was to take place one week after the incident.

The day before the funeral, Vladimir Masters actually had the guts to show up.

When Danny laid eyes on Vlad in the hotel lobby, the spike of fury was almost a relief. He balled his hands into fists. "Vlad!"

Vladimir looked at him, unsmiling, and he went completely still. "Why, Daniel. I'm surprised to see you here." His voice was flat, though, lacking the usual mocking tone he directed at Danny.

The fury Danny had felt seemed to drain out of his toes – at least a little. Suddenly the situation seemed awkward. "Not as surprised as I am to see _you_ here," he shot back half-heartedly. "What do you want?"

"I'm here for Maddie's funeral, of course," Vlad answered, his voice cold.

Daniel's heart dropped somewhere in his shoes. _Oh. Of course._ Vlad may have been Daniel's arch-enemy, an evil, conniving half-ghost, and the biggest turncoat Jack Fenton had ever faced, but he did love Danny's mom. Even if Danny hated him for it.

"Oh," he managed, his voice sounding far away in his own ears.

"Yes, 'oh'," Vlad mocked. "You may not like me, young badger, but I did love your mother."

"I know," Danny said. That sense of despair and overwhelming self-hatred was coming over him again, and he could do nothing to fight it. "… I'm sorry," he added belatedly.

Vlad's smile was thin. "Of course you are." His smile faded. "It would seem that no one has told you, then?" he added.

Daniel stared at him. "Told me what?" he asked thickly, his blood rushing in his ears.

"Why, your father's will. It states that should anything happen to himself and Maddie, that you and your sister are to live with me. Since Jasmine has also passed away, however …" he trailed off.

Daniel stared at him.

"There's no way I'm living with you," he said flatly, but he barely heard himself. He was thinking about Phantom. Phantom's words.

_I still exist! You still turn into me!_

"My boy, you are only 14. You have no choice," Vlad answered. "But I would hardly have chosen this arrangement myself – your father always was a buffoon. Believe me, no matter how much I may want to mold you into the perfect minion, I—"

"No!" Danny shouted. "You don't get it at all! You don't _know!_" And he wasn't about to explain it, not to Vlad Plasmius. Vlad would think there was a way around it. He'd never believe that Danny's ghost self could separate Vlad's ghost half from himself. "I – am – not – living with you!"

Vladimir actually seemed surprised by Danny's vehemence. "Daniel, I—"

But Daniel spun around and stalked off down the hall to his hotel room, startled that for the first time since the accident, he wanted to cry.

* * *

Depressingly, Danny wasn't even invited to Sam's funeral. Mr. and Mrs. Manson had never really liked him or his parents, and Mrs. Manson was the only person to (rightly) blame Danny for Sam's death. At first he'd been sure he didn't want to attend any of the funerals, but now … he felt like he owed it to them.

So he came anyway, standing back from the proceedings until the empty casket (there really wasn't much left after the explosion) was lowered into the ground and everyone started to leave.

He stared at the gravestone, alone. _Samantha Manson, Beloved Daughter. 1992-2006. _It seemed completely insufficient to describe Sam.

"Sam … I'm sorry," he said, voice cracking, and finally, he cried.

He cried again at Tucker's funeral, which he _was_ invited to, but by the time the condolences had all been offered again and again, the tears had dried and that pit of cold sickness was back. It rotted in his stomach through the entirety of his family's funeral, and burned when Vlad gave the eulogy for his mother. _I can't let myself turn into that … that thing_, he thought furiously._ My parents were ghost hunters. How could I do that to their memory?_

_I can't let Vlad take me to his home. It's the only way to stop myself from turning into Phantom-Plasmius!_

"And so we lay to rest the greatest ghost hunters of our time," Vlad said softly, "and their dear daughter."

_I'm going to beat him. I won't turn into him. I promised!_

* * *

"Mr. Fenton, I'm afraid you have no choice in the matter. Mr. Masters is, by your father's will, officially your legal guardian. You can challenge the guardianship when you turn 17."

Danny gaped at the lawyer. "Look, just because I'm 14 doesn't mean I don't know what's best for me!" he snapped, hands balled into fists at his sides.

"According to the law, you don't," the lawyer said. He gave Danny a sympathetic look (and Danny almost visibly steamed with fury). "I'm sorry; I know the last week's been rough for you. But it's not my decision. It was your parents' decision, and I have to honor that."

"That's ridiculous!" Danny threw his arms up into the air. "You can't make me go to Vlad's house. You _can't._" The lawyer opened his mouth to reply, but Danny steamrolled over him. "Something – really bad will happen if I go there, and trust me, you don't want to be responsible for it!"

The lawyer looked at him incredulously, and then actually had the gall to chuckle. "What are you telling me, that you know the future? Look, I promise it won't be that bad. Mr. Masters has lots of money and runs a huge corporation – I'm sure he won't be smothering you or trying to be a surrogate parent …"

"You don't know the half of it," Danny muttered under his breath.

"But in any case," the lawyer continued, standing up and coming around his desk, "you are under Mr. Masters' legal guardianship, and I can't change that. I'm sorry." He steered Danny towards the door. "Call me if there's any real trouble, Mr. Fenton." And the door slammed shut behind him.

Daniel stared at the shut door, both furious and frightened at the same time. Cold sweat broke out on his brow. "It's all happening exactly like Vlad said," he muttered. "I'm going to become …"

_No._ He was not going to become that monster. He just had to be strong. He had to overcome his grief and despair and guilt over getting his whole family and two best friends killed.

_Yeah, right._ Danny's chest was tightening at the very thought, the despair crashing down on him as he remembered again that he'd never walk to school with Sam and Tucker again, never kiss his mom on the cheek or hug his dad or fight with his sister. He couldn't fight it off. He wasn't strong enough to keep the emotions at bay.

* * *

Which was how he found himself staring at the Fenton Ghost Catcher.

It had been over a week since Danny had even been in his house, even though he had the keys – he had only walked by his house once and he could barely do it, gritting his teeth and glaring straight ahead without glancing at it. Now he had no choice. Vlad would be taking him to Wisconsin tomorrow; it was now or never, even though it nearly killed him just to stand here amongst all his parents' ghost-catching inventions.

The last time he'd tried to use the Ghost Catcher, he'd ended up with what amounted to a split personality – a part of him that wanted to be a flying superhero and another part that only wanted to kick back and relax. But the first time he'd only split into – well – himself and a ghost-self, with all his ghostly powers. He was taking a risk, trying this again, but … he had to do it. Then, he could chuck his ghostly self into the Ghost Zone, or maybe lock him in a Fenton Thermos and bury it. Or something.

If he didn't have a ghost half to remove, then he couldn't combine with Plasmius and create that … other Danny.

Danny grabbed a Fenton Thermos and set it on the ground next to the Catcher. Then he went ghost for the very last time, and dove through the Ghost Catcher.

The next thing Danny knew he was slamming into the ground. He rolled over, looking up, and there was his ghost, staring back at him.

"Hey!" the Phantom said.

"Hey, what?" Danny shot back, scrambling for the Thermos.

"No way-! Don't even think about it-!" Danny's Phantom dove for the Thermos as well, and at a top speed of 112 miles per hour, he was far faster than Danny. Coming back upright and tossing the Thermos casually in one hand, the apparition glared at his human self. "I know what you're thinking, and I – don't – want – to – go – in there! Again!" he added for good measure.

Danny remembered how cramped it had been the one time Tucker had accidentally sucked him into the Thermos (it really gave a new perspective on reality, and all he'd hoped was that he wouldn't have the urge to turn back into a human), and he suppressed the wave of emotion that accompanied the thought of Tucker. He chose to ignore the comment. "If you know what I'm thinking, then you know why I have to do this," he protested. "I – no, _you – _can't combine with Vlad Plasmius. You'll – we'll - … uh …"

"I become a monster." Phantom jutted out his jaw. "Well, maybe I don't have to become one. Look how much of history we've changed already," he pointed out. "I've already got the Ghostly Wail, which I'm not supposed to get for another ten years, and you just split off from me on your own instead of because of what Plasmius does. Who says we – I – uh …"

"Still combine with Vlad?" Danny snorted. "Well, that other Danny still exists, right? Besides … can we really risk even the chance?"

"Well, maybe changing _me_ is the wrong thing to change!" Phantom shot back, shaking the Thermos.

"But-but if I go to Vlad's with you in me …" Danny took a deep, suck-it-up breath. "I don't know if I'll be strong enough to …"

"Hey!" Phantom chucked the Fenton Thermos at Danny's head, causing his human half to yelp. "Genius! We know what happens if you decide to let Vlad split us apart! So just – don't – let him!"

Danny stared up at him, rubbing his forehead. "But maybe I always knew and did it anyway," he pointed out, looking down with a dejected expression.

"You really believe that?" Phantom raised an eyebrow. "Come _on_. You're – we're – a 'C' student, not total idiots."

_You know, _Danny thought, _I can't believe I'm having this argument with _myself._ Jazz would've loved this._ But Jazz would never see it, and it was Danny's fault.

Wow … he had to stop thinking like that. "I guess," he allowed reluctantly.

Phantom didn't look impressed. "Look … do you really think I _want_ to combine with Plasmius?"

Danny made a face. "No! Gross," he and his ghost said together. Danny couldn't help but crack a small smile at that.

"I'd take the Thermos over that!" Phantom continued. "So get your act together."

"Okay, okay, I'll try not to be totally depressed," Danny allowed. "But how come _you're_ not totally depressed? Since we're the same person. I think."

"Hello? Ghost half? I don't do emotion. Not like that, anyway." Phantom glanced over at the Ghost Catcher. "That's probably why you wanted to pull me out. So I could …"

"Be the real me," Danny finished for him. "Great." The worst part was that it sounded rather appealing at the moment, to not have feelings …

"But we're both the real Danny," his apparition said firmly, cutting into Danny's thoughts. "So that's stupid." He jerked his thumb at the Catcher. "So … let's fix this? Or you still want to put me in that?" he pointed at the Fenton Thermos lying innocently on its side.

Danny glanced at the Thermos. It was within arm's reach; if he snatched it up, his Phantom couldn't beat him to it.

_If I don't protect Amity Park, who will?_

Wasn't that what he'd told Sam and Tucker when Walker made him Public Ghost Enemy Number One?

"Okay," he said. "Let's fix this. And when I turn seventeen, I'm moving back here and doing what I do best."

"Yeah? What's that?" smirked Phantom.

Danny smiled a thin smile. "My job."

_tbc_


	2. Home is Where

**Chapter 2: Home is Where …**

"Welcome to your new home, Danny," Vlad pronounced proudly as he walked the boy into his Wisconsin Castle.

Daniel brushed Vlad's hand off his shoulder, turning to the older man sharply. "Don't talk to me, don't touch me, and – actually, don't even look at me," he thundered before he wheeled around and stalked off up the stairs, his backpack slapping against him.

Well, that wasn't entirely unexpected. Danny had been silent for the entire drive, glaring at the floor and occasionally Vlad with his arms crossed in front of him. _Of course he wants his distance, _Vlad mused. _Be gentle; you have an entire lifetime with him. _There was plenty of time to mold Daniel into the perfect minion … or destroy him.

But Vlad wasn't really in the scheming mood. Madeline Fenton – the final prize of so many of his schemes – was dead. What was the point any more? World domination could only bring so much joy, after all …

There was a soft cough from upstairs. "Uh, Vlad?"

Vlad looked up to find Daniel shifting uncomfortably. Vlad smiled, trying not to look too evil. "Yes, my boy?"

"Uh … which room is mine?"

"Second door on your right," Vlad answered, and he smirked outright when Daniel slunk towards said room. Embarrassment could be such a tool.

And so could grief, Vlad mused. He himself felt ill at the very thought of Maddie, but he could control that sadness and use it, just as he'd used his jealousy. Daniel was still untrained in such things. Perhaps that could be … exploited.

"I'm certain the boy has brought along certain ghost-catching items invented by his idiot father," he said to apparently thin air. "Remove them from his luggage. If Daniel is going to live here … he'll have to live by my rules."

"Vatever you say, Vlad, vatever you say," intoned a voice, and three ghost vultures flew off.

* * *

Daniel, however, was worse than reticent. Vlad arranged for them to share dinner that evening, but the conversation was incredibly one-sided.

"Well, tomorrow I'll have to see about enrolling you in the local school."

"Mm." Daniel didn't even look up, chasing a pea around his plate with a fork. He'd eaten maybe three bites, and all of them from his mashed potatoes. Not that Vlad minded the waste of food.

"I'm certain you'll like it. It's a private school, primarily funded by yours truly."

"Great."

Vlad sighed. "You know, the grief does pass. I—"

"The last person I need a lecture on grief from is a lonely old man with no friends," Daniel growled, but he didn't look up from his plate.

Vlad brushed off the comment, smiling to himself. Perhaps it could be considered progress. He picked at the wound. "I took the liberty of having your old man's ghost-catching inventions removed from your things. After all, here in Wisconsin—"

"You what?"

Now _that_ was progress. Daniel shot to his feet, his hands slamming down on the table and his eyes flashing green. _Ah, the scary eyes! How I love that temper._ "Now, Daniel. Here in Wisconsin we hardly have any ghosts – except yours truly, of course – and you and I both know you don't need those things to fight them anyway, hmm? And you certainly don't need anything to remind you of your dearly departed family."

Daniel was visibly fuming. "I didn't bring that stuff to memorialize Dad – I brought it in case you pulled any stupid tricks! And—" he broke off, his eyes widening slightly as he straightened, raising a finger. "And you knew that, didn't you?"

Excellent; the moment of realization. Vlad _lived_ for that. "Very good, Daniel! I knew you were bright," enthused, clapping even as he stood, towering over Daniel. The boy scowled. "No more of those pesky toys interfering with me … and as we both know, I am the stronger hybrid here." He raised an eyebrow. "So let's keep the antics to a minimum, yes?"

Daniel glared at him, but he slowly sat back down. "I knew you had some reason for agreeing to take me in."

"Well, I was rather taken by surprise by your father's will," Vlad admitted, "but who am I to look a gift horse in the mouth?" He paused. "But don't worry; I don't have any nefarious plots in store for you. Although you may be skeptical, I do share your pain."

"Sure," Daniel said darkly, his gaze again on his plate.

"Trust me," Vlad continued, "I wish as much as you that this tragedy had never happened. There is no point to having _you_ without Maddie."

Daniel stiffened at that, but said nothing.

Vlad's lips pressed thin as he watched the teenager, feeling a little ill at how he was using Maddie's memory like a tool. Perhaps it would be best to let Daniel simply stew in his thoughts for a while. "Sleep well, Daniel," he said, and left the boy to pick at his meal alone.

* * *

But Daniel didn't sleep well. He hardly slept at all, between tormenting dreams of the Nasty Burger exploding and knowing that Vlad Plasmius was three rooms away, probably waiting for the first chance he got to destroy Danny or plotting something nefarious, no matter what he said.

He was trying to stop constantly thinking about his dead friends and family, but just about everything reminded him of them. They had been his whole life, after all … and without changing who he was, he couldn't let go of their sudden deaths or forget them so easily.

_Changing who I am. Right._ That, he realized, was exactly what he'd been trying to do – or would be trying to do? – when he let Vlad separate his ghost and human selves. Yet, he could admit to the temptation of it. Right now it felt like the pain was eating him alive.

He thought back to his conversation with Phantom. Now that his two halves had been rejoined, he remembered the conversation from _both_ ends – and he understood what his ghostly self had meant by 'I don't do emotion'. He remembered vividly what his ghost had been concerned with, and that was primarily continuing to exist, preferably as he currently was. There was no sense of fear, and the grief had been like a ping on a radar, small and easily ignored.

If he could live like that …

But Daniel knew he _wouldn't_ live like that. His ghost half would take the chance to rip Plasmius out of Vlad and would try to destroy Plasmius by overshadowing him, only to combine with the evil ghost. So it was stupid to even dream of it.

He needed to talk to somebody about this. But who could he talk to? The only person still alive who knew his secret was Vlad. _And wow, that is one depressing thought._

Danny felt a sudden chill, his breath coming out in a puff of mist. "Oh, great … either Vlad is running around being evil, or his ghost vultures are messing with my stuff again …" He threw back the covers, ready to go give his new guardian a piece of his mind, when he heard a voice.

"Why, hello there, sonny, been a little while, don'cha know!"

"Gyah!" Danny jumped, and turned around to find the Dairy King. "You! Uh … hi," he said lamely.

"You seem a little upset there," the portly ghost said, smiling widely. "I recommend cheddar. It'll put you right to sleep, don'cha know."

Danny smiled thinly. "I don't think cheese is gonna solve my problem," he sighed. "I just have a lot to think about."

"Maybe you need someone to talk to, then?" the Dairy King suggested.

"Are you offering?" Danny asked, crossing his arms in front of him. He wasn't sure he wanted to divulge his problems to the Dairy King, who would probably suggest gorgonzola bleu cheese as a solution, but anyone at all was better than Plasmius.

"Oh, no! Kings just point people to other people to talk to!" The Dairy King laughed. "But I think you should talk to someone who understands your problem, don'cha know. And give them some Swiss for the help."

"But that's just it, I don't know anyone who understands my prob—" Danny cut off. There was one person involved in this mess who was neither a horribly evil future self nor dead. "Clockwork!" Well, technically he _was_ dead, but. "But he kind of tried to kill me before," he allowed, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Don't worry about it! Being dead isn't so bad!" the Dairy King declared.

"Uh, pass," Danny answered, his mind wandering. What he wanted to know, more than anything else, was whether or not he still turned into an evil version of himself – and Clockwork would know the answer, since he could see the future. Danny had already changed some things; for instance, he already had the Ghostly Wail, and he hadn't come to Vlad's out of desperation – he'd been forced to come. Was it enough? Could he avoid becoming evil?

And just before the accident, hadn't Clockwork been sending all those ghosts from the future to destroy him? But since the accident, he hadn't sent anything at all. In fact, there hadn't been _any_ ghostly activity in Amity Park – which was pretty odd, come to think of it.

"I'm gonna go see Clockwork," he announced. "Thanks, Dairy King."

"Sounds like a great idea!" cheered the Dairy King. "And we kings don't need thankin', don'cha know. It's our job!" The ghost floated off towards the ceiling. "Don't forget to get your daily helping of dairy products, now-!"

"I won't," Danny muttered. "Going ghost!"

A moment later Danny Phantom stood where Danny Fenton had been. He floated off the floor. _Now, _I _know that Vlad has a ghost portal. And I bet I know where he keeps it!_

He dove through the floor.

Danny was almost surprised when he didn't encounter any ghost shield preventing him from crossing into the not-unexpected lab in the basement of the castle. _But, _he reflected_, that's the advantage to living with an evil archenemy that has the same weaknesses as me. _If Vlad put up a ghost shield, he'd be just as trapped as Danny. At least, until he put up shields that _he _could activate, but Danny couldn't.

"I should probably be careful not to get caught," he mused aloud. He didn't want to give Vlad a _reason_ to make any shields, after all.

The portal was open, which surprised Danny a bit. But maybe Vlad didn't have any reason to keep it closed. Hadn't Vlad said that they didn't have any ghosts in Wisconsin? _He probably blasts them back into the Portal before they have a chance to get anywhere. _Regrettably, Danny had to admit that Vlad was a lot more powerful than himself and could probably take care of unwanted ghost problems a lot more quickly.

Well … who was Danny to look a gift horse in the mouth? He smirked, and shot through the portal.

The Ghost Zone was a pretty creepy place, and probably always had been. Danny knew it always would be – at least for the next ten years. He made a face as he floated along through the ectoplasm. He could be in here a while, after all – he didn't really know where to even start looking for Clockwork's lair. "Oh, well," he sighed. "Not like I have anything better to do … except mope …"

He wandered for a while; Danny had no idea how long, having lost all sense of time. _This is stupid. I need to find someone to ask about Clockwork, or I could be here for years._

"Will you be my friend?"

Danny jumped and spun around to find himself facing quite possibly the most clingy ghost in the afterlife. _And that is just what the doctor ordered!_ "Klemper!" he cheered, and threw his arm around the hunchback's shoulders. "I'd be glad to be your friend," he grinned falsely.

"Really?" Klemper's face lit up, and Danny felt guilty for using him for all of three seconds before the ghost grabbed him in a bear hug, squeezing Danny so tightly he almost felt his ribs crack. "I'm so happy!"

"Ow, ow, let go!" Danny gasped, but the ghost only squeezed harder until Danny was forced to go intangible to escape. "Okay! Okay, I love you too," he panted, hugging his aching chest. "But no more hugging, okay?"

"Okay." The ghost sounded a little disappointed.

"All right." Danny caught his breath again. "So, new friend … friends do each other favors, right?"

"Right," Klemper nodded enthusiastically.

"I need you to do me a favor. Can you tell me where Clockwork lives?"

Klemper gave him a horrified look. "We're not supposed to go there," he warned unhappily.

Danny waved him off, forcing another grin. "It's okay! You don't have to come with me. I just need to … talk to him, you know?"

"He doesn't talk to strangers," Klemper answered.

"Well, we're not strangers. We've me—oof!"

Danny was unable to finish his sentence when Klemper hugged him again. _Oh, right. Short attention span, forgot about that_. "But you're my new friend and I don't want Clockwork to destroy you!" the specter wailed.

"He – ow – he won't destroy me!" Danny strangled out. "I promise! Please let go," he pleaded.

"Oh, sorry," Klemper drawled, apparently remembering that his new friend couldn't handle hugs. He watched Danny wheeze for a bit.

"I promise he won't destroy me," Danny panted. "I'm just going to go say hi, okay? He's my friend too." Which was … well, more than stretching the truth, but he really needed Klemper to tell him how to get there.

"He's your friend? Wooow. I didn't think Clockwork had any friends," Klemper breathed, obviously impressed by Danny's conquest.

"Yeah, well, he's got at least one, right? Me," Danny lied. "But he forgot to, uh … give me his … address. So I need you to tell me how to get to his home."

The hunchback clearly had no problems with this explanation. "It's that way," Klemper pointed. "Can I come too?"

Danny winced. Unfortunately, though, this was his charade, and this was Klemper's home territory; if he made the lonely ghost mad, it would just be a battle he didn't need. Besides, what if Danny got lost? "Sure," he said – and dove out of the way when Klemper tried to hug him again. "Woah! No hugs!"

"Oh, right. I forgot," moaned Klemper.

"It's … it's okay," Danny stammered, brushing himself off absently. "Just take me to Clockwork's place."

"Okay, new friend," Klemper enthused, and the two apparitions wandered off into the ghostly void.

* * *

After a while the emptiness began to look familiar, cogs floating in the ectoplasm, until Danny recognized Clockwork's castle in the distance. Klemper was slowing down, though.

"It's not safe," Klemper moaned.

Danny saw his chance to dump the ghost. "Then you just wait here while I go to say hi. Or you can go someplace else. Uh … either works," he shrugged, letting out a choked half-laugh.

"Do you think Clockwork would be my friend too?" asked Klemper.

"I – I dunno," Danny said honestly, looking out at the castle. "He seems kind of reclusive." He looked up at Klemper. "Seriously, I promise I'll be back soon if you just want to wait here."

Klemper was actually trembling a little. He nodded. "Okay. Promise?"

"Promise," Danny said sincerely, feeling a little bad for Klemper. He kind of knew what it was like now, after all – being all alone and wishing he wasn't.

He floated down towards the castle.

Despite Klemper's claims that the castle was not safe, Danny didn't encounter any ghostly guards, ghouls, or specters as he flew down the halls. It was so empty as to be a little spooky. "Uh, Clockwork?" he called nervously. "It's … me. Danny Phantom …?"

"Ah, Daniel Fenton," came a voice from the shadows, and Daniel whipped around to find himself face-to-face with Clockwork's constantly changing form. He'd long ago learned that his ghost sense didn't work in the Ghost Zone, but it still threw him for a loop when ghosts snuck up on him.

"Gah!"

Clockwork smirked at him. "You're right on time. Come with me." He floated off down the hall.

Daniel followed him, nonplussed. "Er … you're not going to try to kill me?"

"Should I?" Clockwork asked mildly, pushing open a doorway. It led into a cavernous room that was strikingly familiar. "Last I checked, Daniel, you were not evil." He smiled.

"Actually … that's what I came to talk to you about," Danny admitted, settling his feet on the floor. "It's all happening, just like my future self – and future Vlad – said it would. I mean, it's not all exactly the same, but I'm stuck at Vlad's house and it keeps looking better and better to just – you know – split myself apart, even though I _know_ what will happen." He took a deep breath and let it out. "You know what will happen in the future, so … I thought I should ask you … do I still turn evil?"

Clockwork was watching what appeared to be an entirely unrelated timeline on one of his several portals. "I could tell you," he said, not turning towards Danny, "but the truth is, the future isn't set in stone. Whether I know what happens or not."

Danny tried to wrap his mind around that statement. "You know, I'm not the brightest person around, but … I don't think that even makes sense," he protested.

"Well, you're only fourteen," Clockwork said, turning back to Danny. "I didn't expect you to understand." He floated away from the teenager. "What you're most concerned about is whether or not the future Phantom exists. Am I right?"

Danny rubbed the back of his neck. "Yeah," he admitted. "I mean, if he exists, then I still turn into him, don't I."

"Perhaps." Clockwork pulled back a curtain. "See for yourself."

Danny floated over, and gaped at what he saw. "Hey! That's the Fenton Thermos!"

"With your evil self inside," Clockwork confirmed. "He exists outside of time now, so it's my responsibility to watch over him – and you."

Danny drew up his shoulders, a pit of despair forming in his stomach again. "Well, great. All that … and I still can't change my future." He rubbed his face miserably.

"Ah, but you already have." Clockwork's smile widened slightly. "Come here." He guided Danny over a portal, and waved his staff.

The portal opened, and Danny gaped. There he was – well, it looked like him, anyway – watching a late-night movie at Sam's house with Tucker and Sam both, pigging out on popcorn and tossing kernels at Tucker while Sam hissed at them to stop and pay attention. "This is what you're doing right now," Clockwork said.

Danny looked at the ghost out of the corner of his eye. "Uh … I'm standing here talking to you. How can I be in two places at once? And how can this be what's happening now anyway? Tucker and Sam are –" he choked, unable to say it.

"Dead? Well … only in one reality." Clockwork waved his staff again, and the portal swirled, revealing the Nasty Burger just before it blew up.

Danny looked away. "I don't want to see that," he snapped.

"Watch, Daniel. It's important you see this," Clockwork answered.

Danny took a deep breath and let it out, clenching his fists, but he looked back up. And blinked.

"This is what really happened," Clockwork said, and Daniel gaped as he saw his family and friends – and Lancer – all floating, safely protected from the exploding Nasty Burger. "I saved your family, friends, and teacher, because I felt that you deserved a second chance." The scene faded from view. "Sometimes humans just need a nudge – or in your case, a shove – to get them going in the right direction again." He smiled.

"Wait a minute," Danny said. "I'm … confused. I saw everyone blow up, and you never saved them." He scowled.

"That is because, Daniel, you are living in an alternate timeline," Clockwork explained. "Unfortunately, I am unable to interfere with Time without creating such offshoots. However, alternate realities are only temporary things. They eventually remerge with the original time stream, and are of little consequence."

"How can you say they're of little consequence?" Daniel snapped, sudden fury welling up in him. "I'm – I'm what? I don't matter just because you interfered with Time? My family and friends are still dead!"

"But only to you," Clockwork answered, seeming unconcerned. "Not to him." He pointed at the Danny Fenton still visible in the portal, poking Tucker and laughing.

"That's – not – fair!"

"Life isn't fair. And that, boy, is something I have no control over," Clockwork said mildly.

"Argh!" In a fit of anger, Danny charged Clockwork. "I'll show you who doesn't matter—"

"_Time out!_"

"Argh!" In a fit of anger, Danny charged Clockwork. "I'll show you who doesn't–" he blinked, screeching to a halt. "Okay, that was weird."

"Daniel, I could abuse this in ways you could never imagine," Clockwork's voice was even. "But I like you too much for that." He floated over to the far wall, and took down a medallion – one Danny recognized from his journeys through time. "I realize this is hard for you, Daniel, so I'll give you a little gift." He placed the medallion over Danny's head. "Grief, since it is spawned by love, is perhaps one of the strongest human emotions there is. So … I'll give you a chance to say goodbye to your friends."

"Say goodbye? Wait, are you going to let me go back in time to—" Danny began to brighten. He could fix this whole thing if he went back in time to the Nasty Burger!

"Oh, no, goodness no," Clockwork laughed at him, and Daniel scowled, hopes instantly crushed. "That would only create another alternate timeline in which another Daniel, once again, experienced that crushing loss. And that, child, is not an option. In fact, it does not happen."

Daniel clutched the ribbon the medallion hung on. "So what does happen?" he asked bitterly. "I go back to Vlad's and eventually give up, and I turn into an evil Phantom? How is that helping anything?"

"Ah, that's right," Clockwork remarked. "You believed Vlad's story about how Phantom was created."

Daniel blinked. "Wait … should I not have believed him?"

"Daniel, I merely control time, I don't dictate your life," Clockwork informed him. "Now, use your time wisely –"

And before Daniel could ask another question, he was being chucked into one of Clockwork's portals. "Aaah!"

He landed on his butt in the middle of Samantha Manson's movie room amidst a sea of spilled popcorn, and found himself facing three sets of eyes – Sam, Tucker, and … his own.

"Uh, hi," he said sheepishly.

Clockwork, back at his lair, smiled.

_tbc_


	3. Reality

**Chapter 3: Reality **

_He landed on his butt in the middle of Samantha Manson's movie room amidst a sea of spilled popcorn, and found himself facing three sets of eyes – Sam, Tucker, and … his own. _

_"Uh, hi," he said sheepishly. _

* * *

The movie was one that he had seen countless times before, so Danny was enjoying pelting Tucker with popcorn more than the movie itself.

"Cut it out!" Tucker protested in a stage whisper before flicking a kernel back at Danny; Danny went intangible, letting it fly right through him. "Hey, that's cheating!"

"You're just jealous," Danny snickered back, picking up a whole handful of popcorn, and Tucker groaned.

"No way! Been there, done that, and I don't do green, ugly, and gruesome!" he answered, flicking more kernels in Danny's direction. Of course, one landed in Sam's lap.

Sam sat up sharply, rolling her eyes. "You guys! Did you come here to watch the movie or not?"

"Dude, we've seen this a billion times! Besides, you can't have popcorn fights at movie theaters, you get kicked out," Danny snickered, throwing his handful of popcorn. Half of it landed in Sam's lap and hair – the rest showered down on Tucker, who was now armed with his own handful.

"No going intangible, Danny!" Tucker warned before he threw the popcorn. Danny laughed, blocking with a hand, and the other half of Sam was covered with popcorn now.

The goth steamed visibly for a moment, then threw up her hands. "Is that the way you wanna play it? Prepare to eat – uh, popcorn!"

She hurled two handfuls at both Sam and Tucker, grinning fiercely, and before long it was all-out war, the movie forgotten. Danny was about to go to the popcorn machine for more ammunition, however, when there was a flash of light and an oddly familiar-sounding squawk of disbelief followed by a thud.

He twisted around in his chair at the same time as Tucker and Sam, and found himself staring at … himself.

Well, his ghost self anyway. But the Danny Phantom sitting on the floor in a sea of discarded popcorn looked … different. Not in any particularly significant way, but kind of how Danny looked after a week of all-nighters ghost fighting: tired and pale.

"Uh, hi," the Phantom croaked, waving weakly.

There was an awkward pause.

"Danny?" Sam was the first to speak, sounding confused.

Phantom startled a little, his gaze flying to her. Danny didn't consider himself any master of psychology, but he could recognize facial expressions on his own face at least, and this Phantom looked confused and surprised, then wistful. "Sam," he said, and then he looked over to Tucker, who was wide-eyed as well. "Tucker …"

Was he choked up?

_Woah woah woah! What is going on here?_ "Who are you?" Danny demanded.

Phantom's gaze shot back to him. "Ah, I-I – I'm Danny Fenton. Just like you," he stammered, floating to his feet. "It's, uh—"

"Hey!" Tucker interrupted, drawing all eyes to him. He pointed at Phantom's chest. "That's one of Clockwork's get-out-of-time-free medallions!" And indeed, one of Clockwork's distinctive time medallions hung from Phantom's neck. Phantom unconsciously reached for it, his fingers closing around the item tightly, and a stricken look crossed his features.

Now Danny was _really _confused. "So are you my new future or something?" If he was still going to look like that ten years from now … _I'd better start working out! _

"No, it's nothing like that!" Phantom waved his hand in front of himself. He made a face. "Besides, if I was, and I still looked like this ten years from now … I'd start working out right now."

"Then why are you here? Why did Clockwork send you? And where _are_ you from?" Sam asked.

Phantom looked stricken again, flinching slightly, and Danny wondered why he kept doing that every time Sam or Tucker spoke. "I … ah …" he looked away, rubbing the back of his neck. "I … I knew this would be too weird," he mumbled. His fingers twitched.

"Spit it out," Danny said. Curiosity consumed him, although he had a nagging feeling that maybe he should go ghost too. After all, he was from Clockwork's lair and he was another Danny Phantom … who was to say that he wasn't the evil Danny from the future disguising himself as Danny …?

"I'm kind of from an alternate dimension," Phantom said finally, shooting Sam and Tucker a guilty look.

Danny gaped.

And Tucker pumped his fists into the air. "I _knew_ they were real!"

* * *

Danny watched as the 'real' Danny – or so Clockwork considered him – and Sam both shot Tucker bewildered looks. His best friend lowered his triumphant arms. "What? You live a comic book life, Danny, so there _has_ to be alternate dimensions. It's like a rule or something," he pointed out.

_Same old Tuck_, Danny found himself thinking fondly, and then he grimaced to himself. _Who I'll never see again from the moment I take this medallion off. _

When he first had landed here in this alternate or real or whatever-it-was timeline, he'd been tempted to just rip the stupid medallion off and go back to his own time. He didn't want to talk to Tucker and Sam – it only made the ache worse.

But now that he was here, listening to them, talking to them, even if it was awkward, he couldn't bring himself to do it.

He rubbed his thumb over the medallion absently, swallowing. The last thing he wanted to do was cry like a little kid. He really wanted to hug them or something, but all he'd do was weird them out and probably get into a fight with his other self, who was giving him a speculating look he knew all too well from his own face. _He's wondering if I'm the evil Phantom I'll bet_, he thought, _escaped from Clockwork's lair. I'd be suspicious too. _

Luckily Sam distracted him. "Really? An alternate dimension?" she asked, raising an eyebrow but looking intrigued in that weird way she had. "So what sends you here?"

"Clockwork," Danny answered, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "He, uh, chucked me in here." He paused. "To … say goodbye."

"Why do you have to say goodbye?" Tucker wanted to know.

But their Danny beat Danny to it.

"The Nasty Burger," he said, his eyes wide. "Clockwork!" He rolled off the couch and got to his feet, facing Danny in jeans and t-shirt with exactly the same stature, his physical polar opposite in every color. "What happened …?"

"Guess," Danny shot back irritably, crossing his arms.

It was the 'real' Danny's turn to look stricken and sick, paling visibly. "Clockwork didn't save them," he said slowly.

A slow burn had started in the pit of his stomach, and Danny hadn't really ever thought it was possible to be literally this angry with himself. Or jealous of himself, either. It looked like he and this 'real' Danny had really shared all the same experiences up until the Nasty Burger blew up. "Nope, he didn't," he said bitterly. "He saved _your_ friends, _your_ family, and _your_ Lancer – not that I miss him much – and – I dunno! Clockwork started blathering about alternate dimensions and how yours is the only one of consequence and -!" He broke off. "I wasn't supposed to happen. What happened to the Sam and Tucker I know was just some stupid side effect of him messing with time."

The 'real' Danny was silent, looking down. Danny felt satisfied in a dark sort of way. _He doesn't know what to say. Well, I wouldn't either. _

"Uh … Danny? In the plural?" it was Sam's voice. Both of them looked up with identical expressions of surprise on their face. "As entertaining as this is, care to enlighten us on what you're talking about?"

Danny blinked. "How do they not know?"

Danny shrugged, looking sheepish. "I, er … never told them. Clockwork rolled back time two hours so I could un-cheat on the C.A.T." He took a deep breath. "Okay, guys, long story short? This really is me, from, uh … an alternate timeline. And I guess Clockwork wants us to help him out."

* * *

"So it's all pretty much happening like Vlad said," Phantom summarized after they had compared notes. The two Danny's had explained in detail what had happened at the Nasty Burger before – or after? – Clockwork had set back time, and the new Danny, whom they had pretty much settled on calling Phantom (it was just easier that way, even after he had reverted to Danny Fenton – in his pajamas, no less!), explained what had happened afterwards to very interested ears. "Not exactly the same, but … pretty close. Close enough to be scary. And my – our – evil self is still back in that Thermos at Clockwork's, so he still exists." He hesitated. "I think I'm the one that turns into him."

"Don't be stupid," Danny shot back. "You got sent here for a reason, right? We'll figure it out," he said confidently.

"Hey, I've got an idea!" Tucker exclaimed. "Why don't you just stay here in our time, with us? I mean, it's not like you can't hide the medallion, and since Danny's both Danny Fenton and Danny Phantom …"

"I-I don't think it works like that," Phantom drawled a little. "I mean, if I manage to not turn into Phantom Plasmius – which is _completely _gross – I've still got my own Amity Park to take care of. Besides, Clockwork only sent me here to get to see you guys one last time. I think."

It was a little confusing, but Sam couldn't deny that it was pretty entertaining having two Danny's – and not split personality Danny's – in one room. Way more entertaining than the movie. They bickered over some of the details, expressed the coolness of the Ghostly Wail in stereo, and generally were Danny-like.

A pile of snack food litter had been added to the popcorn thanks to the length of the story, although all the food had been pretty much put down by the time Phantom started telling his end of the story. Phantom hadn't touched the bag of Doritos he'd been given, playing with it between his fingers but not eating. Actually, he looked really thin, and tired to boot.

_Of course he looks like that. How would you feel if your family and friends all died at once?_ _Well, friends anyway._ Sam kind of suspected she might dance on her parents' graves. "I wish I knew what to say," she said.

The look Phantom gave her was startling in its gratitude. "Just being here is great," he said sincerely. His fingers went back to the medallion around his neck. "I guess Clockwork knew what he was talking about. I really needed to … just be able to say goodbye." He rubbed the back of his neck and looked down for a moment, and there was an awkward pause.

Phantom broke it. "Speaking of Clockwork …" he looked back up at Danny. "He said something about how I believed Vlad's story about how Phantom and Plasmius combined, like it was a lie."

Danny looked thoughtful. "Well, there's no way I'd trust Vlad in the present. But in the future, he was pretty different, you know?"

"Yeah …" Phantom recalled, and both Danny's adopted identical thoughtful expressions. Sam tried not to snicker at them. "It was like Plasmius being ripped out of him made him a completely different person."

"Maybe it did," Tucker threw in his two cents. "It's not like your mom would have hung out with someone totally evil in college, right? So what if the accident that made him half-ghost made him evil, too?"

"Then shouldn't I have turned evil when I had my accident?" Danny asked.

"No, that's ten years from now," Phantom said darkly. "Hey!" He rubbed his forehead where the granola bar wrapper had hit him and glared at Sam.

"Now, now, nothing like that," Sam said in a mock-Jazz voice, smirking. "We're doing positive thinking now, okay?"

Phantom smiled ruefully and a little nostalgically. "Yeah."

"Besides," Danny spoke up, "I think Vlad was made evil by being jealous of Dad. He did say having ten years to think about it gave him some time to realize what had been important in his life."

Phantom frowned slightly. "Yeah, he did …"

"Phantom? What are you thinking?" Tucker drawled.

"Just that it's possible his priorities hadn't really changed at all," Phantom said slowly. "Or maybe, ten years of sitting all by himself gave him time to try to make him out to be the perfect, merciful angel that tried to save me from my suffering or something." He paused. "What if the story wasn't really a lie, just a … you know? Half-truth."

"He's more the type to tell his evil plans in the form of a joke or something," Danny snorted. "But it's not like he doesn't lie to get what he wants." He hesitated. "But what would he gain from telling me – uh, us – a lie about how our evil self was created? I mean, you'd think he'd want you to have the whole truth so we could stop ourselves from separating Vlad from Plasmius." He blinked. "This whole two of me thing is getting really confusing."

"Tell me about it," Phantom snorted, a weak smile crossing his face. "Well, it might be that he figured I – we – would take our knowledge back to the past and use it to try to change the future – which I am – and maybe he'd get a better outcome this time around."

"But there's no reason to lie about it, then," Tucker observed.

"Yeah, I was thinking that," Phantom nodded. "Or maybe he didn't even think he was telling us a lie any more. Maybe after ten years of stewing and wishing he had Mom or whatever, he really convinced himself that the story went the way he told it."

"That's pretty crazy," Sam said skeptically.

"Well, Vlad's pretty nuts," Danny cracked. "He could really use a cat."

"A Doctor Evil cat," Sam chimed in.

"… and he could create a mini-Plasmius? One is enough!" Danny laughed.

Phantom laughed too, but he was more subdued. The wistful look was back, Sam noticed. _Outside looking in. I know how that feels too._ "Getting back to the subject at hand, though," she began, trying to usher on the conversation and wipe the look off Phantom's face, "supposing Vlad really was full of crap ten years from now, what really happened? Or happens."

Both Danny's looked nonplussed for a moment then shrugged simultaneously. "I have no idea," Phantom admitted.

"We need a better source of information for that," Tucker remarked. "And since we can't look into an alternate dimension's future and find out what really happened –"

"_If _I ever let it get that far," Phantom said suddenly, his voice flat, "which I don't intend to let happen." His eyes were ice-cold with conviction.

"Well, yeah," Tucker allowed, unnerved. Sam felt a rock in the bottom of her stomach at Phantom's conviction; it was a little frightening, cold and hard, not fire-y and angry like Danny usually was. "But since we can't look into the future, we can't see what Vlad's planning on doing." He got a sly smile. "But we know who can," he singsonged.

To Sam's surprise, Phantom jerked back, holding the medallion tightly against his chest. "Oh, no, I'm not going back yet," he protested. "I – I want to see my family before I go. I guess your family," he admitted guiltily to Danny. "Clockwork sent me here to get my goodbyes, and … I really want to get them."

Danny looked doubtful. "I dunno. I mean, what am I supposed to say? 'Hey, Mom, Dad, this is me from another dimension?' Dad would be screaming 'ghost!' before you could say 'emergency ham'!"

"And the worst part is, he'd be right," Phantom groaned. "Aw man …"

Sam drew a deep breath and let it out, watching this sad, wilting other-Danny slump. It was awkward, she decided. It was incredibly flattering and reassuring, in an odd way, to know how much Danny cared about her and Tuck and everyone else, but to see what would happen to Danny without them there … "Hey, don't worry," she said, a quick plan forming in her mind. "You won't have to say a word. Danny … you up for a sleepover?"

* * *

Twenty minutes later, Danny was walking home with Tucker, just like he had hundreds of times before – and never would again. The nostalgia was going to choke him, he was sure of it. He had traded clothes with the Danny of this world ('Hey, I don't even have to fly home to get my stuff,' he'd joked) and as Sam had suggested, for tonight the alternate Danny – 'Phantom' – would be Danny Fenton from this timeline.

He looked up at the FentonWorks sign overtop his home and smiled. _This is how it should have been. I guess in a weird way I'm glad this is the 'real' timeline. Even though my timeline still sucks, and I still have to go back to it._

"This is your stop," Tucker said unnecessarily, giving Danny a weak grin. "See you tomorrow, right?"

"I wouldn't miss it for anything," Danny answered. "See you tomorrow."

They had a weird moment while Danny scuffed his shoes on the pavement and Tucker watched Danny's feet. "Hey," Tucker started.

"Don't." Danny cut him off. "I'm gonna miss you guys for the rest of my life, but … at least you're not gone everywhere." He smiled thinly. "Maybe Clockwork will let me visit sometimes." _But I doubt it. _

"Okay." The smile Tucker gave him was more genuine. "Night, Phan- I mean, Danny."

"Night, Tuck," Danny waved, jogging up the familiar steps and opening the door to the familiar home with familiar people.

He swallowed hard as he shut the door behind himself, and felt to make sure Clockwork's medallion was safely hidden under his shirt. "Mom? Dad?"

"Danny!"

It was Mom, coming out of the kitchen in full hazmat gear. _Apparently it's another late night for them_, Danny thought peripherally. The rest of him was choking on words.

"You're home early. Did you have a good time at Sam's?" she asked cheerfully.

"Yeah," Danny croaked, trying to clear his throat of the lump in it. "Yeah, it was fine. We just got bored with the movie so Tuck and I decided to head home."

He wasn't going to be able to play this cool, even though he'd promised this timeline's Danny that he wouldn't 'get all weird on them'. He started when Maddie moved closer. "Honey, are you all right? You look a little sick!"

"Just too much popcorn," Danny managed, barely. "Mom … I …"

"LOOK!"

The bellow from the kitchen made Danny and his mom both jump, and then Jack Fenton came pounding into the foyer, proudly presenting another ghost-catching or possibly ghost-detecting item. "It's the Fenton neural controller! The first step of our Fenton Suit for ultimate ghost-catching!"

Danny took a deep breath and let it out, a little relieved. He loved his dad, but Jack could be really oblivious, and at the moment he was completely oblivious to how his son was staring at him as if he'd thought he'd never see Jack again.

"Honey, I told you to leave that alone until I got back in the kitchen," Maddie scolded.

"Awww, but it was so close to being done …" Jack moped. "Ah well, you can always check the wiring once I get it in the Fenton Pants!"

"I suppose," Maddie allowed. "Let me do that, honey …" they started for the kitchen again, Maddie gently removing the delicate hardware from Jack's hands.

Danny watched them go. _Forget it. I don't care how it looks. I've explained weirder things. _He took a step after them. "Wait," he stammered.

Jack and Maddie both turned to look at him. "Yes, sweetie?" Maddie asked.

Danny wrapped his arms around his mom, squeezing her tightly. "I love you," he said, trying not to let his voice shake.

"Danny? What brought this on?" Maddie asked, genuinely surprised and sounding very touched.

Danny ignored her, going to his Dad next and hugging as much of his father's massive girth as he could manage. "You too, Dad," he choked out. "Sometimes I forget to tell you that, but … I really love you guys."

"Aww, it's okay, son! It's not like we're going anywhere," Jack said cheerily, wrapping Danny in a hug that was almost as powerful as Klemper's.

_I wish you were right. _Danny's lungs were squished, but he didn't care.

"We love you too, son," Maddie added, pecking Danny on the cheek. "Now go get some rest, okay? And if you hear a scream, it's just your father."

"I don't scream!" Jack protested, releasing Danny from the bone-crushing hug. Danny choked again, but this time because the wind had been knocked out of him. "I wail! Wail on ghosts, that is!"

"I-I'm gonna go upstairs. Sleep sounds like a good idea," Danny managed to say in between gasping breaths. "Night," he wheezed. "And I meant it. Uh. I love you."

"Mm-hmm, we know," Maddie said. "We've always known that. Night, sweetie!"

Danny retreated up the stairs he hadn't used in almost three weeks to the room he hadn't slept in for the same amount of time, feeling a little shaky. _I was so lucky and I had no idea. Way luckier than I ever thought I was._ He sucked in a breath and let it out.

Then he went intangible and invisible at once, and sunk through the floor into the kitchen.

He watched his parents work on the Fenton Pants into the wee hours of the morning.

* * *

Being in his old house didn't help Danny with the nightmares at all. He tossed and turned and after the third time he woke up gasping for breath, halfway through a transformation to Danny Phantom, he gave up.

It was a peaceful night outside, quiet, and his ghost sense hadn't picked up anything emerging from the basement It felt like the events of the last three weeks had never happened.

_Maybe just tonight I'll pretend they didn't. _

Danny enjoyed his ghost powers: they provided a great way to play the occasional prank on Dash, easy escapes from things he wanted to avoid, and gave him a sense of purpose, as if he was meant to have powers even though he'd gotten them from an accident. He didn't like fighting ghosts unless he was in a really foul mood, though – they were dangerous and only managed to get him into more and more trouble – both as Fenton and as Phantom. How many ghost hunters had been on the tail of Phantom, last he'd checked? And at school, Fenton had a terrible record of detentions and disruptions … culminating in the cheating he'd done on the C.A.T.

But if there was one power Danny never wanted to give up, it was the ability to fly.

He floated absently around town that night, avoiding Valerie's apartment carefully. There was the Nasty Burger, being rebuilt in this timeline … in his own timeline it was further behind schedule, the place having been cordoned off as the location of a crime scene investigation for two weeks. Tucker's house … Tucker was out like a light, but his PDA was plugged into the wall. Danny could never see into Sam's room on his night excursions; she pulled down the blinds to block out the sunlight the next morning, but this time he saw a puff of mist escape his mouth. _A ghost?_ He floated down towards the window.

"Got any thress?"

"Go fish!"

_Oh, duh, it's **me**, _Danny thought with a wince, hearing his own voice inside the room. He floated back a bit, starting back for FentonWorks. This wasn't his home timeline; it was time to stop pretending it was.

* * *

The next morning Danny staggered downstairs on autopilot. He felt the way he usually did these days: drained, and physically exhausted. _I've gotta learn how to sleep again. Didn't Jazz always say that three days without sleep makes you legally insane? Maybe that's why I agreed to let Vlad pull Phantom out of me …_

He picked a cereal at random and poured a bowl. He had almost no appetite still, anyway; he expected to maybe get a few bites in before he stopped wanting more. He was just using the puttering around as an excuse to wait for—

"Hey, Danny."

Danny was jerked out of his reverie by the appearance of Jazz – the very person he'd been waiting for. He'd begun to despair that he wouldn't have time to see her, which somehow made the whole situation seem worse, like he was betraying Jazz twice over.

At least with Jazz he didn't have to be subtle, since she Knew.

"Jazz!" he exclaimed, jumping to his feet and hugging her tightly.

"Ack! H-hey, what's going on? Danny!" Jazz protested in confusion.

"It's a long story," Danny answered, squeezing her before letting go, his chest tight. "And I don't have time to tell you, but ask me when you get to school or something." He looked at his forgotten breakfast. "Just … thanks. Thanks for a lot of things." He swallowed hard. "I've gotta go meet Tuck and Sam a- over at Sam's house before class, so I'll see you after school! Bye!"

He didn't hear the muttered, "Oh, so where's the ghost _this_ time?" behind him, or see the fond smile she wore.

* * *

Sam couldn't decide if Phantom looked better or worse when he came flying up to the door of her home, panting: in one sense, he seemed like he was more at peace with himself than before, a little less oppressed. But the bags under his eyes were worse, and of course, he still looked like he was anorexic next to the Danny she knew. "Hey," she greeted, trying to be casual as she ushered him in. "How did it go?"

"Great," Phantom said with conviction. He met her eyes, and a small but strong smile curled his lips. "I got to tell them what I needed to."

"Good," Sam grinned. What else could she say? Phantom's … incident … was so far beyond anything like her own experiences that she had almost no concept of what to say or what to compare it to. "We're just waiting on Tucker now …"

"Where's, uh … your Danny?" Phantom asked, looking around.

"Huh?" Danny came in from the kitchen, mumbling through a mouthful of cereal. "Oh, hi." He swallowed. "Did, uh … did everything go all right last night?"

Phantom actually colored a little, vivid on his pale face. "Well, you might have to explain why you suddenly felt like hugging everyone, but yeah, it went fine."

Danny looked away, a fleeting smile passing. "Yeah, well … I don't blame you."

"Did I miss my cue?"

Sam, Phantom, and Danny turned to find Tucker in the doorway. "Hi, Tuck," they said in unison.

"Hey, all," Tucker waved nonchalantly. "You doing okay, Phantom? You don't look so good."

"Really?" Phantom looked down at himself. "I feel better. Mostly. Oh, wait." He unslung his backpack and reached into it with an intangible hand, throwing whatever-it-was at Danny. "Your clothes for today."

"Aah-!" Danny almost caught the clothes with his face and his cereal, then went intangible and let them fall around his feet. "Geez, watch it!"

Phantom shrugged slightly, looking embarrassed again. "Sorry. Wasn't thinking," he called as Danny gathered the clothes up and went to the bathroom to change.

"No surprise with how tired you look," Sam pointed out. "Have you been sleeping at all?"

"Well …"

"Don't answer that." Sam held out a hand to stay him and rolled his eyes. "All right. We're still agreed on what we're going to do?"

"Go with Phantom to Clockwork's lair and find out what Vlad lied about so Phantom knows what to do to avoid becoming evil?" Tucker asked. "Of course!"

Sam looked at Phantom. "Are you okay with that?"

Phantom gave her an uncertain look. "I can't help but think Clockwork will probably say no," he said. "I mean, he didn't tell me the whole story before, so why should he now?"

"Well, he tried to kill me – us – before he saved everyone for me," Danny pointed out, coming back from the bathroom. "Here's your pajamas."

"Thanks." Phantom took the offered clothes. "I remember the scythe incident … but then he helped me get to you guys."

"Clockwork isn't evil," Danny said with conviction. "He just … operates by different rules than the rest of us."

"Yeah? It's kind of pissing me off," Phantom admitted.

"And now we're running late to school, so we'd better decide whether we're doing this or not," Tucker interrupted.

"I vote yes," Sam said. After all, she didn't want any Danny to become evil Danny.

"Me too," Danny added. "A day with Clockwork's better than a day with Lancer."

"Me three," Tucker voted.

All eyes turned expectantly to Phantom.

"I … think this is a bad idea." He smiled wanly. "But I'm kind of outvoted, so …" He pulled the medallion out from under his shirt. "Everyone grab on!"

Danny, Sam, and Tucker all grabbed a hold of Phantom's arms and shoulders.

He tossed the ribbon off his neck, and in a flash of green light, they were gone.

_tbc_


	4. The Other Side

**Chapter 4: The Other Side**

"No." Clockwork's voice was flat, and final.

"Come on!" This was Tucker, who threw his arms in the air in frustration. "You've shown us the future before!"

"Tucker, he didn't mean for us to see that," Sam pointed out irritably.

"Actually, I—" Clockwork started, but Phantom cut him off.

"_Please_," he begged, "I've got to know what Vlad lies about so I don't turn into—"

"Is this it? Is this where he is?" Danny was staring at the Fenton Thermos in the little room where Clockwork had rested the future Phantom.

"Ah, this is ridiculous," Clockwork muttered to himself. "_Time out!"_

All four of the children froze in place, time stopped for them, and Clockwork rubbed his temples. "I knew this had to happen," he muttered, "but it doesn't stop this from being annoying." He floated down to Phantom and reached into the boy's pocket, pulling the medallion out and placing it around his neck. "Mr. Phantom."

The boy from the alternate timeline blinked then looked up to see Sam and Tucker frozen mid-argument, the real Danny pointing at the Fenton Thermos, and Clockwork floating over him. "Waugh!" He jerked back. "Uh … what happened?"

Clockwork reminded himself that this Daniel had never seen this particular trick before. "I froze time. Unfortunately, four teenagers all trying to talk to me at once is a bit of a trick, even for one such as me."

There weren't many perks to the whole time-watching job: dealing with Observers, constantly monitoring to ensure that his intervention wasn't needed, rarely leaving the relative misery of the Ghost Zone … but as subjects went, Daniel Fenton was rather entertaining. He waved a hand in front of his double's face, blinking. "Weird." He looked back at Clockwork. "You're not going to let us see the future, are you." It wasn't a question, his tone dejected.

Clockwork sighed. "No, child," he answered. "Because it hasn't happened yet."

"But – but _he's_ right in there, right now," the boy protested, pointing at the Fenton Thermos. "The future is right there and I don't want that to happen!"

"Haven't I already told you? It already doesn't happen. Your future was saved."

"Yeah, in _his_ reality," Danny shot back bitterly, his finger accusingly moving towards his doppelganger. "I know his reality is 'the only one of consequence' or whatever, but mine matters to _me!_"

"'Timeline', Daniel, and that's an important distinction," Clockwork reminded Daniel gently. "You are both in the same reality, or you would be speaking to two different Clockworks. And if there is another Clockwork in another reality, that is something I do not know." He smiled slightly; the thought had tickled him from time to time, but he had no control over the fabric of space: only the fabric of time. "But I doubt that you care," he added, allowing for the look of fury on the boy's face.

"All I want to know is how to avoid becoming _Him._" Daniel didn't have to point for Clockwork to know who he was referring to. "Please … please, help me!"

Clockwork looked at the boy, taking in his human afflictions – exhaustion, fear, anger – and the effects it was having on his corporeal body. He had known this would be hard for Daniel, even in ways he did not know – being split across timelines was an awkward thing, particularly when one was the hub of that timeline. "That is not my place," Clockwork answered, but he continued before Daniel could protest. "Really, Daniel, do you have so little faith in yourself? You are strong in ways that other ghosts can only imagine, and humans would never dream."

"My friends and family are what _make_ me strong," Daniel answered, looking a bit stricken by Clockwork's words. "I can't do this alone, but I promised them …"

"Hang onto that promise, then," Clockwork answered. He smirked. "I could feed you cheesy lines about how they are in your heart or some such, but the truth is, you look outside yourself too often for things that are inside you already. A common teenage affliction," he added dryly.

Daniel gave him a look that spoke volumes.

Clockwork merely raised an eyebrow, a look that might have been comical had he not transformed from his child self to his adult self at that very moment. "I cannot tell you your future, Daniel. That depends on your own choices, not those of Vladimir Plasmius. So." He pressed a medallion into Daniel's hand. "I suggest you take this time to say goodbye, as I first recommended."

Daniel's gaze shifted to the medallion in his hand, and he sighed but trudged over to his two arguing best friends.

Clockwork found business to do elsewhere in the room. Some things even those who knew everything were not meant to see.

* * *

Danny looked at the frozen Sam and Tucker. It was a little weird to have both of them standing next to him, but he could only talk to one at once. He placed the medallion over Tucker's head.

"—and it's stu—hey, what gives?" Tucker blinked as he woke up from his frozen state. "Sam? Danny?"

"Uh, it's Phantom Danny," Danny said. "Clockwork froze time."

"Ooh," Tucker nodded knowledgably. "So what gives?"

"He said no," Danny answered, sighing. "I think he's going to just send you guys back." He shrugged a little. "I guess if he knows everything he knows what he's doing …"

"I dunno, Danny. He did try to kill you that one time," Tucker pointed out, but Danny shook his head.

"I don't think he's going to do that this time." Danny hesitated. "Look … I just wanted to say thanks. You're not really _my _friends, you're his –" he pointed at the frozen Danny next to the Thermos—"But you still helped me out."

"Hey, don't talk like that," Tucker protested. He grinned. "Doesn't matter what reality you're from; you're still Danny."

"Timeline," Danny absently corrected, but he smiled wanly. "You'll always be my best friend, Tuck."

"Good, wouldn't want that to change," Tucker answered. "But hey …" he hesitated. "I don't know exactly how to say this, dude, but you should … you know … keep on living. Sure, life'll be different with us gone, and I'm glad you miss us, cause you know, we are your best friends. But don't cry about it forever."

Danny sighed aloud. _You don't understand what it's like, Tuck._ "I hear you," he said instead. "Thanks." He leaned forward slightly. _Aw, what the heck._ He wrapped his arms around Tucker tightly, squeezing him. "I'm gonna miss you."

"Oof!" Tucker was obviously startled by the hug, but he hugged back, slapping Danny's back. "Best buds forever, dude. Don't forget to visit, okay?"

"I'll try to get the chance," Danny said dryly, pulling back. "Gotta take off the medallion now so I can say bye to Sam, okay?"

"Why can't Clockwork just unpause time so you can say bye all at once?" Tucker asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Uh …" Danny looked at the back of the relatively distant ghost. "I don't think he wants anyone pestering him while I'm talking to you guys. I dunno," He could imagine the two not talking to him begging for the chance to see the future; he knew he would be.

"Well, he does like his privacy, I guess." Tucker reached for the medallion. "Here you g—" He froze as soon as the ribbon left his hands.

Danny turned towards Sam then, swallowing hard. This was going to be harder. He placed the medallion over her head. "Sam?"

"Well that—huh?" It was Sam's turn to look confused. "Oh, did Clockwork freeze time again? I think he's kind of a jerk about that." She ran her fingers through her hair. "Danny?"

"Phantom, actually," Danny said, just to make sure she too was clear on which Danny she was talking to. "He's definite about 'no'."

"Oh yeah? Let's go give him a piece of our minds," Sam said militantly, but Danny put a hand on her arm. "What?"

"It's okay." Danny sighed. "He … kinda made a good point. I think I'm supposed to figure this out for myself. Guess he's prepared if I do turn into _Him_, anyway." He smiled ruefully. "I do end up in the Fenton Thermos for all eternity, after all."

"You won't become him. You promised, remember?" Sam gave him a confident smile. "You know, you should give yourself more credit. For a superhero, you sure do have a lot of insecurities."

Danny smiled thinly. "I guess."

"Besides, when has Vlad ever gotten the best of you with a plan? You'll figure him out."

"I hope so." Danny's voice was dark. "I mean, Phantom-_Plasmius?_ _Gross!_" Danny and Sam said in unison, making Danny laugh. "Is that an 'ew' or a 'yikes'?"

"I think it's both," Sam answered, taking his hands, and then she blushed inexplicably, which made Danny blush too, also inexplicably. "So I guess this is goodbye, huh."

"Unless Clockwork lets me visit, yeah," Danny answered. He looked down at their intertwined hands, remembering the time Ember had made him fall in love with her. Now that she was gone … at least to him … he could admit that maybe that feeling wasn't just Ember's doing. His blush grew brighter. "Sam … I … I think I …"

"Me too," Sam broke in. "I think." She blushed more brightly as well.

"I-I don't think an inter-timeline dating thing is gonna work," Danny said a little thickly, looking over at his other self. _You're way more lucky than you know. _But being able to say it to something other than a gravestone made Danny feel as if a weight had been lifted off his shoulders.

"I guess not," Sam admitted softly.

Danny swallowed hard. "I'm gonna miss you. I … geez … uh …"

"We'll miss you too," Sam said, and Danny's heart seemed like it was going to try to beat its way out of his chest. "Different timeline or not, you're still Danny. We'll always be your friends."

"Funny, Tucker said the same thing," Danny grinned, rubbing the back of his head.

"It's the truth." Sam grinned before sobering. "You won't become a monster. I know it."

"Thanks, Sam." Danny unlocked his hand from hers so he could hug her. "It means a lot to hear you say it."

Sam didn't reply, squeezing Danny tightly as she hugged him.

"_Time in!_"

"Gah!" Danny jumped away from Sam as the ghostly Master of Time let time start again, and Sam looked just as startled. "Warn me next time, geez!"

Tucker looked dazed. "What the …" The other Danny didn't look much better. "Ugh …"

"You've said your goodbyes," Clockwork intoned.

"But he didn't get to see what happens in his future!" the other Danny protested. Danny took a deep breath and let it out – the explanation was getting tiring.

"That's not necessary," Clockwork answered, obviously not about to explain himself again. "And unfortunately, I do have a schedule to keep. So … off to school with you three." He pressed a button on his staff.

"But—"

"Hey—"

"Dan—"

But the three were gone, and Danny was left standing there, the weight of Sam's medallion resting in his hand.

"They'll get to school on time," Clockwork said, floating up next to Danny. "And now, it's time for you to return to Plasmius'."

"I don't want to go back there," Danny said bitterly. As helpful and healing as it had been to say goodbye to his family – and he did feel much better, although nowhere near as healed as he wanted to be – the thought of going back to a reality where everyone was still gone was a hard pill to swallow.

"Sorry, Daniel." Clockwork's voice was calm. "But when _I _say 'it's time', it really is _time._"

His thumb moved on his staff, and suddenly Danny was falling through ectoplasm towards Vlad's Portal. "Gyah! Going ghost!" He turned into his ghostly self and floated, taking a deep breath. "Phew …"

"FRIIEEND!" Danny suddenly found himself trapped in a tight, strangling bear hug, and he grunted. "You promised you'd be right back but you were gone for so long!"

Klemper was back, obviously.

"Ow!" Danny panted, managing to go intangible and slip out of his grasp. "Ah, Klemper! Sorry I took so long," he stammered. "I, uh, lost track of time." And he really had, he realized. "How long _was_ I gone?"

"Uh … I dunno …" the hunchback ghost looked confused at the concept of time. "I missed you!"

_Long enough_, Danny thought, groaning. His ribs positively ached from all the hugging. "I missed you too," he lied, patting Klemper on the back. "But I have to go home now …" _Oh, the irony of calling Vlad's stupid castle home._

"Why?" Klemper was obviously dejected.

"Because, uh … my guardian will worry, like you worried," Danny answered. _Actually, he'll probably kick my ass for being in his stupid portal._ "But I promise I'll come back and visit, just like I came back from Clockwork's, okay?"

Klemper's memory was not the best, but he clearly remembered the promise. "You keep your promises," he complimented fondly.

_I sure hope I do, _Danny thought, licking his lips. _I'd better!_ "So it's okay if I go now?" he asked, reaching for the side of the huge, floating football that blocked the portal.

"As long as you say hi soon," Klemper moaned.

Danny winced on behalf of his soon-to-be-abused torso. "I will," he said, heaving upwards to push the football clear of the portal.

"Bye, friend!" Klemper called, and Danny waved as he passed through the portal—

And right into Vlad Plasmius' chest. "Oomph!" He bounced off the other hybrid and fell to the ground on his butt, wincing.

Plasmius raised an eyebrow over one glowing red eye. Danny glared up at him. "And what," Plasmius demanded, "were you doing sneaking around the Ghost Zone all night, Daniel?"

_A lie, a lie, quick!_ "I-I, uh, thought maybe my friends had become ghosts! S-so I went into the Portal to find out!" he stammered, floating back upright.

"Oh, how quaint. You're a poor liar, Daniel." Plasmius leaned over him, emphasizing their height difference. "Now, the truth this time, if you will?"

Danny felt a flash of irritation. He straightened to his full height as well, and floated upwards so they could look each other eye-to-eye. "None of your beeswax."

"Ah, but it is my beeswax, as you are now legally my responsibility, and it is _my_ Portal you are using." Vlad smirked. "So I ask you again, Daniel: what were you doing in the Ghost Zone?"

"I'm not telling you," Daniel answered flatly. "Can't a guy have a little privacy? I'm mourning my whole family here!" He smirked as well, but his eyes were haunted. "I guess a lonely old man like you would have a hard time understanding, though."

Plasmius' eyes flashed, and a beam of ecto-energy shot out of them, hitting Danny square in the chest before he could react. "Aah!" He slammed into the wall behind him and slid to the ground.

"Boy, you have no idea what you're talking about," Vlad snarled. Then his voice turned sickly sweet. "Imagine how I felt, though, waking up this morning to find that you were gone! Imagine my concern!" His voice began to harden. "Despite the Jack Fenton in you, boy, you are still Maddie's son, and I would not want anything untoward to happen to you – that I did not cause myself, of course," he added as Danny struggled to his feet. "Especially now that my dear Maddie has passed on."

Daniel did his best to ignore the speech, but his chest still tightened at the mention of his parents. Vlad would keep doing that to him, he thought, keep eating away at him with jabs and comments about the dead until he went crazy and _begged_ to have no emotions.

He brushed himself off self-importantly as he straightened, steaming with balled-up fury at this man, and a half-formed plan took shape in his mind. "If you think that was bad," he started, "Just imagine how you'll feel about this!"

He shot a beam of ecto-energy from his fist and into one of the expensive pieces of equipment in the room, and steam and smoke poured out of it. _Perfect!_

"Oh-!" Plasmius sounded irritated, and he went towards the power boards, turning off the half-destroyed device. "What do you plan to do, boy? Try to attack me with a smoke screen? I have twenty more years of experience with these powers than you, and—"

But as the smoke cleared, he found that Danny Phantom was nowhere to be seen.

* * *

Up in his room, Danny shoved all his loose change, extra clothes, and his school ID into his backpack. _There, I think that's all the essentials._ He swung the backpack over his shoulder, went intangible, and flew out of Vlad Plasmius' castle.

_Forget him and forget Wisconsin_, Danny thought angrily. _There's only one future for me here, and that's Phantom-Plasmius._

And, Danny resolved, he would never, ever look back.

_tbc_


	5. Where the Heart Is

**Chapter 5: Where the Heart Is**

Running away from Vlad Masters seemed like a great idea … for about a day.

Danny flew in a straight line away from Vlad's castle for two hours, fueled by pure fury, then started following the interstate highway. _Anywhere but Vlad's_, he kept telling himself, but about six hours after his literal flight from the older hybrid, the hunger pangs got bad enough that he had to settle at a trucker's stop.

_Nothing like being surrounded by big, sweaty men to boost your appetite_, Danny thought to himself as he sheepishly ordered a burger and fries and settled down to eat, driven to food by sheer need rather than any want. The truckers were loud, boisterous, and even though they were speaking English, it might as well have been another language for all Danny understood. He tuned them out, eating, and considering what to do next.

Staying with Vlad had been a bad idea in the first place, he reasoned. But where was he going to go? He supposed he could try his aunt's place out in the boonies, but he really didn't want to live out there in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by hillbillies. It might have been okay for his mom's sister, but Danny was pretty sure he'd go nuts there.

Maybe he could try to cut it on his own. After all, it wasn't like he was a _normal_ fourteen-year-old; he had ghost powers. He could use them to … do what? What kind of job would ghost powers be handy for? Besides, he wasn't even old enough for a work permit – which would have to be signed by Vlad Masters. _Argh!_ He could always try lying about his age … but where would he stay in the meantime? He only had fifty dollars (now $46.50 thanks to the meal) on him, and the rest of his money was locked away in his bank account. Under which he was listed as a beneficiary, who had to have a parent or guardian sign out on to get money.

This wasn't going to work out quite like he … what, planned? He hadn't planned anything. He'd just thought he'd run away and everything would magically be just fine. _Fenton, you can be really stupid sometimes,_ he thought irritably.

"Hey, Jim, c'mere! How you doin'?" boomed a trucker four feet from Danny, making him jump. The trucker was apparently waving over a friend or acquaintance or something, and the man who came over was tall but paunchy, with a goatee._ Kinda looks like Lancer, _Danny couldn't help thinking, then felt a pang of regret and guilt.

"Joel! Great to see ya. What brings you out this way?" Jim asked. Danny tried to tune them out while he picked at his fries (thinking of Lancer had instantly killed his appetite), but they were too loud. _Maybe I should just get out of here_.

"Rolling down 5, making some lumber stops. You know what they say about logging around here – all roads lead to Amity Park," Joel laughed.

Danny blinked, suddenly very interested in their conversation. He didn't notice (and luckily neither did anyone else) when he gradually faded into invisibility, unconsciously hiding so he could listen in.

"Place is a zoo these days, isn't it. For being so small." Jim chuckled as well. "You know what they say about the town, right? That the whole place is haunted?"

"Aw, I don't believe in ghosts. Do gotta wonder who's doing all the damage, but if it's bringing business my way, that's all I want."

"Don't believe in ghosts, huh? Well, I didn't either till I drove through that place one night, Business 345." Jim's voice took on an ominous tone. "Saw two ghosts fightin' right over my truck."

"You're full o' crap," laughed Joel, but Jim wasn't blinking, and neither was Danny.

"God's honest truth," Jim swore, putting a hand over his heart. "Don't know how else to explain that they were flyin', shooting green stuff at each other like laser beams. Some big monkey thing with wings on his back and a kid with white hair. Stop laughing, Joel, I swear it's the truth."

_Clockwork, wherever you are, are you trying to send me a message?_ Danny thought, covering his mouth with a hand to hide the snickers. What were the chances that here, a good twelve hours out of Amity Park by interstate, he'd run into a trucker that had seen him fighting _Skulker?_ _Big monkey thing with wings on his back. Oh, I am so telling him that one. Especially after the purple-backed gorillas._

That was when he remembered he wasn't going to be anywhere near a Portal for Skulker to come find him. Or any of the other ghosts that regularly made their escapes into Amity Park.

What was Danny thinking? Obviously, as long as he was running away from Vlad, there was only one place to go: back home.

* * *

He didn't make any more pit stops that day; if he was hungry, or tired, or otherwise afflicted, he barely noticed the closer he got to Amity Park. He'd been away for only five days, but it felt like five years. He flew by FentonWorks without looking at it; that was a place to tackle later. He ignored the Foley's house, and the Manson's as well; he couldn't deal with that. The streets were quiet and the houses almost all dark; it was almost 3 o'clock in the morning, after all.

Danny didn't feel the exhaustion until he was in the huge park in the middle of town. The moment his feet touched the ground, he realized he was trembling from dehydration, and he could no longer hold his ghost form. He transformed into Danny Fenton, and suddenly it was all a hundred times worse; he buckled to his knees and slumped to the grass.

_Figure this out in the morning. For now … sleep …_

And for the first time since the explosion of the Nasty Burger, Danny managed to sleep for more than two hours at a time.

* * *

He woke up with a start just before his evil future self started cackling madly in his dream to the sun streaming in his face. "Ugh …" he rubbed his eyes hard with one hand, shakily pushing himself upright.

"Hey, kid, you okay?" a jogger asked him.

Danny rubbed his head, brushing blades of grass out onto his lap, and didn't look up. Hopefully the guy didn't recognize him from the pictures in the paper right after the explosion. "Uh, I'm f-fine. Just taking a morning nap before school, that's all, ahaha …" Danny staggered to his feet, shocked by how stiff and sore he was. "Thanks for your concern, gotta run, bye-!" He jogged off in the direction of Casper High instinctively before slipping into a grove of trees, going ghost, and seating himself in a tree.

"Great, Fenton, this is just great," he muttered to himself. "And what are you going to do here?" At least he knew people in Amity, though. And he could guard the town as Danny Phantom, which was, he confessed to himself, what he really wanted to do. At least for now.

The dream of becoming an astronaut, always so distant before, seemed impossibly far away now.

"Gotcha, ghost!"

The shout seemed to come out of nowhere, and Danny jumped visibly. _Ghost? Where? My ghost sense didn't even go—_

The ectoplasmic blast slammed into the trunk Danny was perched next to. _Oh, wait, _I'm_ the ghost! I am?_ Right, he hadn't changed back into his human form. Smart. Not exactly the entrance he'd wanted to make.

Certainly not with Valerie Gray running around town.

He shot up out of the trees, thankful that his backpack had attached itself to his corporeal form. (The discovery that whatever Danny was wearing when he transformed, including backpacks, disappeared, had proven useful more than once. Why would Danny Phantom, presumably dead, need a backpack?) "Valerie, look, I—" he started desperately.

"Don't give me that!" Valerie was decked out in full ghost-hunting gear, crouched on her hoverboard as she flew up out of the trees to point no less than five ectoplasmic guns at Danny. "I thought you were gone for good when the Nasty Burger blew. You _were_ behind that, weren't you?"

Danny paled slightly. _In a manner of speaking …_ "I—" he started, shaken, but Valerie had clearly perceived his hesitation.

"I knew it!" she roared, and fired.

"Gyaah!" Danny dodged wildly, but his hair was definitely singed by the last zinger. _No reasoning with her like this! Definitely not in any shape to fight. Gotta hide!_

He turned tail and fled at top speed.

"You killed the whole family of one of my friends, you murderer!" Valerie accused furiously, shooting with alarming accuracy. Danny's side was seared by her gun and he veered sharply right, hoping to throw her off his trail. No such luck; she was right behind him. "And you killed my classmates! And now, I'm gonna kill _you!_"

Worse than her weapons were her words. Every one of them cut into him like glass, and he grit his teeth. Now was definitely not the time for tears, but he'd almost forgotten that he was indirectly responsible for their deaths. If he'd just returned the C.A.T. answers promptly instead of flirting with the idea of cheating, then none of this would have happened! If he hadn't let himself combine with Plasmius …

"Argh! Stand still!" Valerie growled, obviously frustrated as they continued their top-speed chase.

Danny mustered himself, forcing a half-hearted "Hah!" over his shoulder. "Sorry I can't stick around and finish this one-sided chat," he strangled out.

"Don't think for a second you're gonna lose me! I know every trick in the book," Valerie roared proudly.

"Yeah? Bet you can't do this one!" And with that, Danny dove into the ground, going intangible.

Valerie pulled up short over his head with a snarl of frustration. "I'll find you, ghost! I won't let you get away!"

Danny snuck off through the underground piping and pavement as far as he dared before coming up and transforming back into Danny Fenton. Immediately his seared side began to burn, and he clutched it with a wince, lifting his shirt to check it. He wasn't bleeding, but he was definitely blistered. _That'll take all day to heal_, he thought miserably. _Great, some return to Amity this was …_

He didn't dare go ghost before school hours again, not up to another round of target practice either physically or mentally. _Valerie's more right than she knows. I got them killed; my future self wouldn't have wanted them dead except that he wanted to be created. And even then, my future self did the killing! No matter how you look at it, I killed them._

He took a deep breath and let it out through his nose. 'I've gotta stop thinking like this," he told himself furiously. "I made a promise, and that's what I'm going to worry about. I'm not going to turn into Phantom-Plasmius, because I _promised._"

"Promised what?"

Danny jumped again, yelping and fumbling his shirt back down around his waist as he spun to face Valerie, who was back in her normal outfit for school and looking concerned. "Valerie!"

Valerie offered a small, sad smile. "Hi, Danny. I thought you went to live with that billionaire guy, what's his name … Vlad Masters? Why're you here?"

For a moment Danny was completely lost for words. He hadn't thought about how he was going to explain it to someone he saw. Heck, he hadn't thought out _anything_ about this stunt. _No wonder Vlad's always a step ahead of me! I feel like I haven't been thinking straight for forever ..._ "Um … I, uh … I kinda ran away," he admitted. _No harm in that, right?_

"Woah." Valerie looked rather impressed. "Why?"

"We don't really get along." Danny wanted to move off this subject; he felt wounded enough right now. _Hm, a distraction … _"This isn't the way to school from your house, is it?" Of course, he knew exactly why she was in this neighborhood, but nothing like making someone squirm to get them to leave you alone.

Valerie blushed. "Oh, well, you know, I went to drop off my Dad's stuff at the cleaner's," she stammered. "Come on, Danny, I'm gonna be late. Walk with me, okay?"

Danny didn't have anything better to do. "Okay." He shrugged a little and fell into step with the ghost hunter. _Gotta remember to get some food, and soon. _His hands were shaking a little, partially from adrenaline but more from dehydration. He wondered if he _looked_ like he'd slept in the park. He sure felt like he had, aching and sore, and now trying not to wince with every step when his shirt brushed his side. _If Valerie sees this she'll put two and two together. She's smart._

There was an awkward silence for a minute or two, then Valerie broke it. "Wow, you really ran away from Vlad Masters?"

"I really did," Danny confirmed, sighing. "You know, he was really jealous of my father and totally in love with my mother, and he's just way too weird to stay with," he complained, ticking off the reasons on his fingers. "Especially because he's _still_ weird about my mom even though …" he trailed off, his voice sticking in his throat.

Valerie shot him an apologetic look. "Sorry. I … I guess I should ask how you're doing, but I think it's probably a stupid question, huh."

"Yeah," Danny grunted. "Really stupid." He kicked a rock on the sidewalk, making it skitter ahead of them. He made no effort to continue the conversation. Here Valerie was, trying to be comforting and kind, while only a few minutes ago she'd been trying to kill him. It wasn't too unusual a state of affairs, but after the accusations she'd sent his way, he felt well beyond miserable. _It's a good thing I'm not at Vlad's right now. I would totally go for the operation, Phantom-Plasmius or not._ And he wasn't sure he was joking about that, either.

Valerie made an odd sound, and Danny glanced up at her. She was looking away from him, her eyes narrowed and her brows drawn in a grimace. "What?" he asked.

"I … I guess I'm trying to find a good way to phrase this," Valerie said, threading her fingers into her hair. "I know you don't wanna hear it right now, but if you need someone to talk to, I'm here for you." She smiled at him sadly. "You really should talk to someone, you know."

Danny sighed aloud. "I know," he said with a scowl. "And I did. But—" he cut himself off. "I … I just had a fight with someone that made it worse all over again."

"Oh, Danny … I'm sorry." Valerie's voice was so full of genuine concern that Danny had to suppress the urge to laugh.

_Oh, the irony … _"Yeah. So I really … don't want to talk about it right now."

"Okay," Valerie bit her lip and submitted, and they walked on in silence, Danny stewing in frustration and self-hate and Valerie unreadable, hovering on the edge of his dark mood like a fragile soap bubble on the surface of roiling water.

They were getting close to Casper High by the time Valerie broke the silence. "My mom died in a car accident when I was eleven," she blurted.

Danny was taken aback by the sudden confession. He'd never asked about Valerie's mother: no one at school did, and Valerie Gray wasn't telling. Until now, apparently. It shocked him right out of his irritation. "Uh …" he swallowed. "I-I'm sorry."

Valerie smiled. "Thanks. It's been three years, but I still miss her." She sighed aloud, shifting her backpack on her shoulder. "I'll always miss her."

Danny scuffed his shoe on the pavement, looking down. "I know," he said in a low voice.

He jumped when Valerie's hand fell on his shoulder. "I know you know." Her voice was weary and old. "When it happened, I was so angry. I wanted to kill the man who hit her, but it was an accident. He fell asleep at the wheel. I missed my mom so much … I never got to say goodbye, you know? She was there one minute, and then one day, she just never came home." She laughed a little, shakily. "I wanted her to be a ghost and come back to stay with us. Kinda funny, looking back on it."

Danny managed a weak laugh. "Yeah …" _Sure, hilarious! This double life thing is gonna drive me nuts._

"But of course she couldn't." Valerie shook her head. "For a long time I didn't want to do anything because Mom was my whole life, you know? We were about to move here to Amity Park. I didn't know anyone, and Dad was just as upset.

"Well … my aunt got us into grief counseling." Valerie hesitated. "It … really helped a lot, just having someone to talk it out with. And it took a while, but eventually the hurt faded, even though I'll always miss her."

Danny didn't know what to say to that story. He offered a wan smile. "Are you saying I should get grief counseling?" he cracked.

The look Valerie gave him was stunning in its understanding. "I'm saying you should talk to _someone_ about it, especially if someone's bothering you," she said evenly. "I mean … losing my mom was bad enough. I can't even …" she hesitated, drawing her hand back. "Sorry."

Danny shook his head. "No, you're right," he said. "I … I was kinda lucky. I did get to say goodbye," he said slowly, and then he panicked as he realized the implications of that. "I mean, not that I knew the future or anything, but y-you know, I was there, I was trying to get them out, s-so—"

"That's not the same as saying goodbye, Danny Fenton," Valerie chastised, nudging him sharply in the side with her elbow. "You think you're responsible, don't you?"

Danny bit his tongue so hard it bled, his side protesting the elbow. "Ow! Uh … w-well—"

"Well, if you are, I am too," Valerie said sharply.

Danny, who had been expecting an immediate rant about the ghost kid, was stopped short. "What?"

Valerie blushed, and it was her turn to stammer. "W-well, I was there too, right? But I didn't save them any more than you did. Neither of us could do anything. … me especially," she added, under her breath. Danny pretended he didn't hear her.

_That's why she's so angry at the ghost me. She feels responsible too. Well, you got there too late, or you would have been shooting me and my future self both down before anything happened at all, _Danny reasoned. _Or my future self would have killed you, or … something._ If Valerie Gray had been there, things would have been very different. "You were too late to do anything," he said aloud. "It's not like you could have known. I mean, my parents didn't … d-didn't see it coming, and they're expert ghost hunters." He nearly strangled on the words.

An awkward silence followed Danny's little speech, and Valerie laughed weakly. "And here I was trying to comfort _you_, Fenton." She sighed aloud when the bell could be heard ringing. "That's my cue. Hey … I guess you're cutting school?"

"Well, I'm not registered here any more," Danny pointed out. "Not registered in school at all right now, so not really … cutting." He shrugged. "More like taking an extended vacation."

"Meet me here after class, okay?" Valerie pointed at the ground. "Right here. We'll go do something that'll help take your mind off things or something. Or talk, or whatever you want."

Danny hesitated. "You don't have work?"

"Are you kidding? I quit the Nasty Burger after … everything." She looked somber. "Looking for a new job right now …"

"Right," Danny sighed. "I'll be here."

"Good," Valerie said authoritatively, and she flounced off in the direction of Casper High.

Danny watched her go until she disappeared inside the school building … and then he let himself slump to his knees.

"Water …"

* * *

Danny found himself a water fountain, which did wonders for his shaking hands and throbbing headache. An hour later he felt as close to normal as he ever did these days, and almost bored.

"Come _on_," he groaned as he made a fourth circle around Axion Labs. "This is Amity Park! Ghost Central! I've got seven hours to kill and I could _really _use someone to take out all this misery on!" Danny shouted.

No answer.

"I'll even take you, Box Ghost!"

Nothing.

This was rather shocking, Danny reflected. It would have been nice to think that it was his own reputation that had driven the ghosts away, but that was about as likely as … as Walker breaking one of his Rules. It was as if none of the usual suspects had even tried to leave the Ghost Zone.

Danny could think of no explanation for this except that something had happened to the Fenton Portal itself.

The last place Danny wanted to be at the moment was his parents' lab. _If I go there, I can pick up another round of Dad's ghost-hunting stuff to face Vlad with, _he reasoned. After all, he wasn't completely stupid; eventually the older hybrid would come to Amity Park in search of Danny. In fact, it might be the first place he looked.

_It's not like I have anything better to do. It's depressing, but … I've gotta face it sometime._

He flew towards his home.

It didn't really feel like his home any more, though. He phased through the door and nothing popped up to destroy him; the house was dark, and quiet.

Danny grimaced. _No one's really been here for weeks_. Even though he'd just walked in the day before and said hi to his parents and goodbye to Jazz in the 'real' world. Of course; the electricity must have been shut off.

He grit his teeth and phased down into the lab.

It was pitch black, and flicking the light switch did nothing. Danny instinctively went to look for a flashlight and bumped his head into a wall. "Ow!" But this close to the wall, he could barely make it out, a greenish glow reflecting off of it. _My eyes._ _Oh, duh! Ectoplasmic energy._ He charged a hand as if he was about to make a blast, and it glowed green like an eerie torch, lighting up much of the room.

The lab had been cleaned out.

All of his parents' inventions were gone, presumably swept away into boxes and storage somewhere. Danny walked forward, vainly hoping that something had been forgotten, that maybe they had merely been packed and not taken, but no such luck; the place was clean in a way it hadn't been for years.

He felt a pang of nostalgia as he remembered his parents running around cheerily, working on the Ghost Gabber and Fenton Finder and other ridiculous but working gadgets. And all for what? Nothing. Everything they had ever made was gone.

Danny knew exactly who was responsible.

Fury welled up in him, only to wane slightly as he found himself staring at the great shut doors of the Fenton Portal. _The doors are shut; that might explain why there aren't any ghosts around._ With no one to fumble the doors open like his father, only the strongest of ghosts, or the most minor, seemed to be able to escape.

Danny instinctively went to the lever that opened the portal, but when he pulled it down, nothing happened. _Right, no electricity. Wait … no electricity?_

He scrambled towards the doors. "It's not that the doors are shut," he murmured. "The portal's dead. It's _gone._" He pressed his hands, both glowing and non-, against the doors and concentrated on invisibility.

The doors went see-through, and all that remained beyond was … swirling ectoplasm?

Danny was startled enough that he jerked back, the light from his hand winking out. "How is that possible?" Danny wondered aloud. By all rights, the portal should have been dead. It was started by electricity – and Danny knew that one firsthand. He would never forget the feeling of electrocution coursing through his body. How had it become … self-sustaining …?

"Your mother was a very interesting creature, after all," said a familiar voice, with contempt and awe both in his tone. "A generator that powers only the most essential aspects of the Fenton Portal, and powered by the very ectoplasm that the portal opens to … she was very smart indeed. Certainly nothing her idiot husband could have come up with."

Danny whipped around and saw … well, exactly nothing. It was still completely dark in the lab. "Plasmius," Danny growled, and shot up through the ceiling, straight out of the roof of his home.

A moment later, Vlad Plasmius joined him, eyes narrowed. "I knew you would come here," he said loftily.

"I knew you knew I'd come here, dimwit," Danny shot back. "Where else was I gonna go, Timbuktu? I'm not scared of you – I'm just not – living – with you!"

"Daniel, I am tired of this tug-of-war with you," Vlad growled. "You do not have a choice in the matter."

"Oh, shut it," Danny snapped. "You could give me up, you just don't want to, like I'm some – some twisted replacement for Mom!" He smiled thinly, feeling something inside himself was being stretched to the breaking point. "Well, I hate to break it to you, but I won't kiss you goodnight and I won't call you 'honey', Vlad."

Vlad's glare narrowed, and suddenly he was upon Daniel, so fast Danny didn't see it coming. _Short range teleport_ was all he managed to think before he was getting a knee to the face. "Oomph!"

"That is the most revolting thing you have ever said to me, child," Vlad snarled, grabbing Danny's shirt and hauling him up nose-to-nose. "You would take the foster care system over me? Over a castle, an excellent school, a _future_, and someone who _shares your grief?_ Shares even your _fate? _" Vlad shook Daniel. "I will give you _nothing _but the best, Daniel. What left do we have to fight over? Your idiot father is dead, and my Maddie is gone!"

Danny was shocked when Vlad's voice actually cracked on the last words.

"Let go," he whispered, and Vlad's fingers uncurled as he pushed the other hybrid away from himself.

"Daniel, let bygones be bygones," Vlad said slowly. "This petty war we're fighting is useless."

Danny licked his lips. He'd really rather expected to be dragged back by the hair to Vlad's home, and he'd prepared for a physical fight – not this verbal assault. Then he remembered what Vlad had told him, ten years in the future.

He took a deep breath. "Vlad … for once I can honestly say it's nothing personal." He charged an ectoplasmic beam in one hand. "But I can't live with you. Not now. Not until I've … I've got all this crap really sorted out. So – ow!"

Danny's back suddenly went ramrod straight as if he'd been electrocuted, and two rings formed at his waist. "Oh no – oh n-!" He tried to force the transformation not to happen, but suddenly he was Danny Fenton, and about six stories off the ground.

He fell. "Aaah! Going ghost going ghost going—"

Vlad caught him, one arm under his shoulders and the other under his knees – and waved the Plasmius Maximus at him. "I've got it set to 18 hours this time, Daniel – more than enough time to fly you back ho—ow."

Danny rubbed the fist he'd just put through Vlad's face and glared at him.

Vlad recovered quickly, looking more annoyed than anything else. "Daniel, I know you're grieving. So am I. But perhaps if we—ow! Daniel, stop that this instant!"

Danny drew back to punch the half-ghost in the face again. "Make me," he snarled.

"Very well, then!" Plasmius' grip shifted to the back of Danny's shirt, and suddenly he was swinging out of Vlad's arms, hanging by the scruff of his neck and nearly choking on his t-shirt. "As I was saying," Plasmius continued as he flew, "I have watched you wallow in your guilt and sorrow for nearly three weeks now, and I have had enough. I have something that can help you."

"T-thanks, but no thanks," Danny strangled out. "Don't want your st-stupid …"

"It will fully separate your ghost and human halves, so that you can survive two ways – without emotion, and without the guilt of the failure to use your powers to save your family and friends," Vlad continued without missing a beat.

"I said, I don't want your stupid help!" Danny choked, fingers grasping the edge of his t-shirt to let himself breathe. "You can't make me do that!"

Plasmius glanced down at the younger, disabled hybrid and smirked widely. "I can make you. But I don't want to force you … it's simply an option."

"An option you really want me to take. And why is that, anyway? What difference does it m-make to you …?"

But Vlad didn't answer.

* * *

Clockwork watched as a confused Valerie waited patiently for Danny's return to the spot where she had told him to meet her, and watched when she walked off in a huff. Everything was progressing exactly as he expected.

A rattle came from the small alcove where he had left the future Phantom.

Clockwork smiled thinly, floating towards the Fenton Thermos – but his smile disappeared when he saw it tip, fall—

It burst open with a rush of energy.

"_Finally!_" the Phantom roared, taking a deep breath and letting it out. "I'd had enough of – you-!" His gaze shot to the Master of Time.

Clockwork, who was currently in his child form, was dwarfed by the ghost hybrid. Phantom grabbed him by the cloak, wrenching the staff out of his hand. "You and your alternate timelines," he snarled. "I still exist! You thought you'd have me destroyed, didn't you?" He sneered as Clockwork took on his adult form. "Well, none of your meddling has managed to wipe me out of Time entirely, has it? No. You need me. You need me so there is no time … paradox." He laughed. "Say something, you ancient, pathetic ghost."

"You're right. I did need you," Clockwork said evenly. "And even as we speak, Danny is well on the path to your creation." He pointed to where Vlad was physically dragging Danny back to Wisconsin. "Even now, you surely remember this …"

Phantom watched as Vlad flew him home, and he did remember that. He remembered the fear of turning into—" This isn't how it was before," he said sharply.

"No, it's not," Clockwork agreed. "But unfortunately for you, it is _your_ meddling that caused this 'time paradox'. No matter, though – he is still becoming _you_."

"You sound almost pleased," Phantom snorted. "Now let's see …" He pressed a button on Clockwork's staff, and another portal in time opened, this one to another timeline and another place, where school had just gotten out and Daniel was walking home with his best friends …

"Well, well, well. We do have an alternate timeline here." Phantom chuckled. "I can fix that." He shot a vicious grin at Clockwork, flinging the Master of Time one way and his staff the other before flying to the Clockwork medallions. "So long, fool!" he called, and dove through the portal, into the True timeline.

Clockwork floated upright again from where he had crashed into the wall, and summoned his staff to himself calmly. "I always wondered what that blank in time was," he mumbled to himself.

And he smiled.

_tbc_


	6. V Stands for Violence

**Chapter 6: 'V' Stands For Violence**

One of the odd aspects of Clockwork's portals was a lack of … precision … when it came to the dropping place. Phantom did not, despite what he had seen in the portal, land in his time directly in front of Danny and his pathetic friends; he appeared some miles away, in a field of corn. _Hmph. Well, this is more inaccurate than usual. Maybe it's because I was the one that accessed the portal. _No one had as much control over Clockwork's staff as the Master of Time himself.

He should have broken the staff, really, but Phantom wasn't entirely certain of what effect that would have on Time, and he didn't want to destroy all reality; he just wanted to destroy everyone in it. He smirked. _Ah, that fool thought he'd have me locked up forever. I knew it was only … heh … a matter of 'time'._ But he was in possession of a medallion, which meant Clockwork had no control over him. _And only a true, utter fool would hang his own weakness in his own lair._

Phantom was confident. So Clockwork had pulled a wild stunt with time and created two realities. What difference did it make? In fact, it could be seen as an advantage. In one reality – one that Clockwork probably didn't even care about – he still came into existence. In this one, obviously, the Nasty Burger had never blown up, or at least not blown up with his family and friends inside. Which meant this was not the reality he was created in.

Which meant that he could destroy his younger self – and how dare he lock Phantom up in a Fenton Thermos! – with no concerns for his existence.

This would be fun … when he took action.

There was one small concern, however, and that was the alteration in his memories. He doubted he would even be aware of it except that he had been outside the time stream when it happened. The reality he was born in was changing, somehow … it probably had to do with how 'Danny' had gotten back to his own time. He had learned something in the future that was now effecting the past. _He's learned how I combined with Plasmius._

Well, Vlad _had _possessed ulterior motives for having Danny Phantom removed from Daniel Fenton. He remembered that clearly, from the part of him that was Plasmius. _I doubt a little thing like my self-doubt would stop him_, he sneered.

For now, however, he relaxed in the corn. _I'm weak from spending so long in that Thermos._ Besides, there was no need to rush the destruction and havoc he could cause. Clockwork couldn't touch him. The only concern he truly had was 'Danny's Ghostly Wail. But if he waited until he was at full strength, that wouldn't be so much of an issue.

_I can't wait to see the look on his face when I show up, _he thought, and laughed aloud.

* * *

Vlad Plasmius waited until Danny had finally settled down – and he was high enough off the ground that the boy wouldn't try to pull a crazy stunt like jumping – to swing him up into his arms again. "Are you over your little tantrum, Daniel?"

Danny punched him in the face. This time, Vlad let his fully human arm phase right through him. "Ah, I see we're still feeling ornery."

"Shut up, Vlad." Danny withdrew his hand and glared at his foster father (and ah, despite everything, that did have a nice ring to it). "You're making a huge mistake."

"Daniel, you are the only one here who has made a 'huge mistake', Vlad informed him crisply. "Which is why I am flying you straight to my private jet and we are going _home._"

In all honesty, he wasn't surprised the boy had run away to Amity Park. He had rather been expecting a little stunt like this. However, he was curious as to why Daniel was so utterly vehement about not staying with him. The boy was hurting; the sulking was to be expected, but oddly … he seemed afraid of Vlad's home.

_Well, perhaps not without reason._ Daniel had demonstrated – several times, now – that nothing Vlad could do would convince him to come to his senses and simply _join_ the older hybrid. He stubbornly clung to his heroics and foolishness, wasting his talent away on frivolities. There was no career in heroics. There was no profit to be made. And with Daniel's grades, the only place he was going was a lower-middle-class job with no future to be found. Vlad simply wanted the boy to realize the potential in his powers. And, well, if he were honest with himself, he wanted Daniel to join him, renounce his father, and convince his mother to marry Vlad.

Now that the latter wasn't possible, there really was no reason to continue to con Daniel into joining him. But there was also no reason for Daniel to _not_ join him … except for his damnable _heroics!_

Daniel's flight to Amity Park had triggered a realization in Vlad: Daniel would always intend to stand against him, for better or worse, and while Vlad did not see him as a threat at this time, the boy was getting stronger, and smarter.

But he could stop this.

He had been working for a while on a way to separate ghosts from humans. It was meant to rip an overshadowing ghost from his host – a useful tool, he had thought, should Danny overshadow his father again to make the blundering fool appear more competent than he was. But now, there was no blundering fool to destroy.

There _was_ a Danny Phantom to deal with. And perhaps, in the long run, it would do Daniel Fenton some good to no longer be dealing with a double life; perhaps he would recover from his grief and become, if not the son that Vlad had always wanted, a son of sorts.

His Phantom half could be put to better use, although he would certainly not tell Daniel _that._

Danny interrupted his thoughts. "I know you think you understand what happened," he said in a low voice. "And you might even think you're just trying to help, although I think you're full of it. But trust me, if you try to separate my ghost half, you're making a huge mistake. Like you'll _never _believe."

Vlad raised an eyebrow, honestly intrigued. "Oh? And how is that?"

Danny glared at him, but the look was pained. He said nothing.

Then his eyes widened and he wrapped his arms around Vlad's neck.

Vlad never saw the ectoplasmic blast that hit him in the back. He was flung forward with a cry of surprise, tumbling towards the earth. Danny clung to him for dear life as he righted himself, turning. "What on –"

"You put my frie—that boy down, ghost!"

_Oh, the irony. _Vlad Plasmius let out a long-suffering sigh when he saw his attacker – none other than Valerie Gray, his beneficiary.

Danny released the death grip he had on Vlad's neck slowly. "Va—uh, look out! He's way more powerful than—"

"Oh, come now, I don't want to hurt you," Vlad said irritably, speaking over Daniel. There was an easy way out of this mess. "I'll simply set your friend down here, if that's all right with you?"

Valerie said nothing. Her gun charged with a loud whine.

Vlad rolled his eyes, not that anyone could tell, and settled back to the earth, putting Danny back on his feet. The look on Daniel's face was honestly priceless. "Ta, then," he said, and disappeared into the ground.

* * *

Danny blinked, then blinked again. "Uh …"

"Darn!" Valerie grumbled. "That's the second ghost that got away from me today!" Then she seemed to remember Danny standing there. "Uh … are you okay, kid?"

"I-I'm fine," Danny stammered, playing along. Technically, Danny didn't know she was the Ghost Hunter, after all …

"Great. See ya-!" And with that, Valerie zipped off.

Danny stood there for a minute, trying to figure out what had just happened. Technically, Vlad shouldn't have had a problem with fighting Valerie. But he'd just … run away? _What am I miss—_

"Danny!"

Well, it wasn't too subtle, but when Valerie came running from the direction she'd disappeared in, he played dumb. "Valerie! U-uh, sorry I didn't come to where I was supposed to meet you, the Wisconsin Ghost—"

"I saw 'im flying away with you," Valerie growled. "Argh, I really—" she hesitated. "A-anyway … I'm not mad. Um."

Their conversation, already on poor supports, ground to a halt.

Danny rubbed the back of his neck. "Thanks for understanding," he decided to say. "I … I thought about what you had to say. I think I do need someone to talk to about … about what happened." He sighed aloud. "But I really can't … I mean … with you …"

Valerie tilted her head, looking down at the sidewalk. "Yeah," she nodded her understanding. "It's kinda harder with friends, huh."

"Sometimes," Danny agreed, although for a completely different reason. _Somehow, I think telling you that my evil future self caused all this isn't going to help our friendship at all. _He swallowed. _This isn't fixing the real problem, though. Which is that eventually Vlad is gonna find me and drag me off to his home and split me in two-!_

"Hey," Valerie said, interrupting Danny's internal monologue. He looked up at her, and she seemed old, somehow, more tired. _The whole double life thing is killing you too, huh._ "You know, you're always kinda easygoing, so this might seem kind of hard to you. But I remember something my grief counselor told me. She said I really had to decide that I was gonna keep moving on with my life. I never really thought of it as a decision before she said that, because I didn't feel like moving on. But I had to."

To his surprise, Danny felt a little irritated. What, he was supposed to just 'move on' even though his whole life had fallen apart? "Moving on is a little harder than just _deciding_ to do it," he shot back.

"Well, yeah, but –" Valerie shifted her backpack. "But do you think your friends want you to just be miserable about them forever?"

Danny opened his mouth to answer and shut it. Hadn't Tucker said the exact same thing to him? "I … you're … I-I think you've got a point," Danny admitted.

"Of course I do. No offense, Danny, but I'm smarter than you are," Valerie said with a little smirk.

Danny started to protest tokenly when the big limousine drove up.

It stopped alongside the teenagers, the side window rolling down to reveal one Vlad Masters. "Well, Daniel, I've had enough of this little stunt of yours … you'll be coming with me now? Or are you going to hide all over Amity Park?"

Danny glared. Valerie shot Danny a concerned look. "Are you going, then?" she asked. "I mean," she added under her breath, "he is a billionaire …"

"No amount of money would make this fruit loop okay," Danny snapped, taking great satisfaction in announcing it right in front of Vlad. "But … he is my ride back to the jet, I guess." _Clockwork said that it was my decisions, not Vlad's, that decided my future. Maybe it really is as simple as just a _choice.

"Short-lived runaway," Valerie said quietly.

"Yeah, I guess," Danny agreed half-heartedly. "I'll call or something, okay?"

"Okay," Valerie said. She hesitated, then leaned forward a little, and hugged him.

Danny blinked then hugged her back, shooting Vlad a glare for his smirk. "Bye, then," he stammered, pulling away, and Vlad pushed the door open for him.

He felt like he was climbing into his coffin.

The limousine started forward. "Ah, doesn't the irony just make you sick?" Vlad asked as Danny sat opposite him.

"What are you talking about?" Danny demanded.

"I do believe you know exactly what I'm talking about," Vlad answered, the smirk never leaving his face. "But more importantly, I am desperately curious to know why this proposed operation is something you are so dead-set against."

Danny licked his lips. He knew enough about Vlad Masters to know that he wouldn't likely believe that Danny Phantom could – and would – rip out his ghost half and combine with it. Nor did he believe that Vlad would accept the idea that _Danny_ would be the dominant half. "You wouldn't believe me even if I told you," he answered flatly.

"Try me, Daniel." Vlad settled back in his seat.

Exasperated, Daniel threw up his hands. "Fine," he spat. "If you try to split me apart, you'll lose your ghost half too, and then they'll combine to create something even _you_ can't control!"

He wasn't terribly surprised when Vlad laughed at him. "That is a wild tale," he agreed, wiping an eye theatrically. "I'm offering you a chance to rid yourself of your pain! That is what you want, isn't it?"

Daniel gritted his teeth and lied. "No." But he did want to get rid of it. Badly. Badly enough to risk creating a monster? He didn't think so.

"As I told you before, Daniel, you are a _very_ poor liar," Vlad responded. His smirk widened. "But don't worry. I know exactly what you need, and as your _father_, I'll provide you with that."

Fury welled up in Daniel, violent and cold and dark. "My father's name is Jack Fenton," he snarled. "And if I had a dad like you, I might actually need that stupid op—gyaah!" Danny threw himself to the side as Vlad blasted an ectoplasmic ray at him with one finger.

"Oh, slipped," Vlad said coldly, transforming. "I only want to do my best by you, boy."

"As long as it meets your own needs," Daniel snapped, still breathing hard. Without his ghost powers, he felt very small and very trapped in the presence of Vlad Plasmius, especially here in the limousine.

Vlad's hand shot out and pinned Danny to the seat by his shoulder. "Think of it as honoring your mother," he smirked, "removing the ghost from her only beloved son."

Danny's heart pounded in his chest, twisting painfully. He had always thought his parents would accept him as a ghost, but would they really have? After seeing what he would become? Not wanting Vlad to see his inner battle, he muttered, "I-I have two words for you: Fruit. Loop."

"Then I suppose you have simply proven you are neither smart enough nor strong enough to face up to breakfast cereal," Vlad sneered.

Danny felt pain. Then he felt nothing.

* * *

Clockwork knew everything, which was why he didn't even let the Observers speak when they came into his lair.

"Yes," he said, not turning around. "He has escaped."

"How could you let this happen?" snapped one Observer.

"He is your responsibility!" added the other.

"Yes, he is," Clockwork said calmly. "And I haven't forgotten that. Everything is exactly as it's supposed to be."

"We expected better of you."

"You don't have any idea what you're talking about," Clockwork sighed. "Surely you have better things to do."

"Not when you are fooling around with the Timeline!"

"I'm not fooling around with anything," Clockwork answered. He half-turned towards the Observers. "Have I ever let you down before?"

He was met with silence.

"I didn't think so." He smiled thinly. "Now, go do your jobs and let me do mine, if you please."

_It's up to you now, Daniel, _Clockwork thought, his eyes going to the True Timeline, where Danny was in his room with his best friends.

Things were about to get interesting.

* * *

"Doesn't it seem like things have been pretty quiet around here?"

Sam rolled her eyes, keeping her place in her English book with a finger. "Tuck, we should just be grateful. No ghost attacks mean we actually have time to study."

Danny rapped his pencil against his math homework, laying on his bed. "Oh, joy. Sometimes I think I'd rather be out fighting Skulker than doing Algebra," he complained. He rolled onto his back. "But you're right, Tuck. It's like … everyone's on vacation or something. Do you think ghosts take vacation?"

"Maybe they're just tired of the Fenton Thermos," Sam joked.

"Maybe they're waiting for something to happen," Tucker suggested. "I dunno. I just have this … feeling, like something's about to happen."

"You've been saying that ever since we met the other Danny," Sam pointed out.

"Me too," Danny said suddenly. He tried to balance his pencil lengthwise on his nose. "It's bugging me. And do you really think that all we were supposed to do is let him say 'goodbye' to you guys? There's no way that's the end of it," he complained.

"I dunno, Danny." Sam blushed for no apparent reason. "But Clockwork wouldn't let us do a thing."

"Yeah, I've been meaning to see him about that," Danny said flatly. "It was just too we—" he paused mid-sentence, visibly shuddering as his breath came out in a misty puff.

"Maybe we spoke too soon?" Sam suggested.

"I dunno, but if it means I get to ignore Algebra for a bit, I'm all for it," Danny growled. "Going ghost!"

A moment later his hair was white, his eyes were green, and he was floating off the bed. "I'll go check it out," he promised, grabbing the Fenton Thermos off his dresser, and he shot off through his closed window.

"Right behind you!" Sam called after him, and with that, his friends clambered down the stairs.

* * *

Danny shot out of his house, Thermos in hand, scanning the area. He didn't see any ghosts immediately, but that didn't mean anything; he'd been caught by surprise before. He floated backwards and upwards to get a better vantage point – and backed right into a broad chest.

"Hello, 'Danny'."

His name was said with such mocking distaste that Danny cringed before he even turned around – and came face-to-face with his future.

"Long time no see," Phantom continued – then clamped his hands around his younger self's throat. "Or in your case, no see at all."

Danny choked as his windpipe was crushed. Strictly speaking he didn't need to breathe in his ghost form, but it didn't stop him from instinctively trying.

Phantom seemed pleased. "See, you're the only real threat to me in this timeline," he sneered. "So you'll just be the first to go. And don't worry – I'll make sure it's nice, long, and painful. After all, I don't need to be careful with _you_ any more."

He flung Danny towards the earth with enough force that he didn't have time to go intangible. He slammed into the pavement and made a small crater right at his friends' feet.

"Danny?" two voices cried in unison.

"Sam – T-Tuck – run-!" Danny strangled out, struggling to rise.

Phantom floated to the ground with a feral grin, and if Danny's heart weren't already stopped, it would have.

_tbc_


	7. Choices

**Chapter 7: Choices**

Danny woke up slowly.

The first thing he was aware of was a beeping monitor. The next thing he was aware of was the metal restraints holding his body down, and the oxygen mask over his face.

_Oh no. Oh _no._ This is—_

"Daniel, you're awake." Vlad was pulling on a pair of gloves that reminded Danny of nothing so much as the Fenton Gloves. "How are you feeling?"

"Crappy," Danny answered, his voice barely a croak. He swallowed hard. "What're you doing?"

"Helping you no longer feel 'crappy', or any other emotion, really," Vlad replied, a sad smile passing over his face. "Helping you recover from your grief."

"I don't want your help," Danny stammered, but his voice broke and faded away entirely on the third word.

Vlad ignored him, raising the gloves. Razor-sharp claws flew out of the ends of each of the fingers, and Danny's eyes widened, fear gripping him. He struggled against the restraints, but he couldn't budge an inch … and when he tried to go ghost, he couldn't.

_I don't remember Vlad mentioning those!_

"This will only hurt for a moment," Vlad promised.

"No," Danny said, but no sound came out.

_It's going to happen! He's going to separate me from my ghost half! _Panic welled up in Daniel, and he struggled more violently, but still he couldn't move or go ghost. _What is Vlad thinking? Maybe he's lost it over Mom. _But there was no way to communicate this.

The moment of truth had come.

Danny closed his eyes, squeezing them shut as Vlad moved closer, and he took a deep breath and held it. _It's my decision, not Vlad's. My decision. I don't have to become Phantom-Plasmius. I promised._

_I promised!_

Vlad shoved his claws into Danny's chest.

Danny screamed.

* * *

"Well, well, well, what have we here?" Phantom sneered. "I do believe we've met before."

"You," Sam breathed. Maybe the other Phantom had been right … maybe he _was_ doomed to become Phantom-Plasmius! "I never expected to see you again," she snapped, even as Tucker helped Danny back to his feet.

"Nor I you." Phantom's voice turned mocking. "We never had a chance after all, did we? That whole inter-timeline problem."

Sam froze. "Wait. How did you know-?"

"Oh, Sam," Phantom hissed. "I may have changed, but I haven't _forgotten_ our little conversation in Clockwork's lair." He smirked. "I don't know why I was so afraid of this glorious future. Can you imagine, 'Danny'?"

Danny had been staring at the Fenton Thermos, which had broken when he landed, before he stared between Phantom and Sam. "Wha …?"

He didn't get to finish the word, much less a sentence; Phantom slammed a fist into his face hard enough to knock him back several feet. He hit the ground hard again.

"You're not Phantom," Sam snapped. "He doesn't turn into you!"

"Oh, but he does," Phantom answered. His lips curled upwards. "And now, the only Danny you ever had a chance with is going to die right in front of you."

* * *

Pain.

It was excruciating, and in this form, it was foreign. Very little could actually make his ghost half feel pain this _intense._

He knew instinctively his human half had passed out even as he felt himself being yanked violently and rudely from the other Danny's body. Ectoplasm spilled from his chest, the claws having wounded him badly – and he was already weak from the Plasmius Maximus, which had forced his powers into dormancy until the effects wore off.

Now that he was separate, however, he had full access to his powers.

He snarled at Vlad, fury and pain making him see red.

* * *

Danny groaned aloud as Phantom hashed it out with Sam; Tucker was at his side. "Dude, something's different about Phantom. He's … I think his brain is messed up or something," Tucker confided.

Danny growled. "Don't know, don't care, and grab Sam and _run. _ I'm not joking!" He rubbed his abused windpipe.

"But Danny, we—"

"Go get me a Fenton Thermos, then-!"

Tucker's eyes widened slightly at the vehemence in Danny's tone then he ran towards Sam.

Danny flung himself at his elder doppelganger with outstretched arms, slamming into his waist and sending them both tumbling down the street.

Phantom was apparently taken by surprise by the act, but it didn't faze him. "It was always the heroics that got me into so much trouble," he said as Danny grappled uselessly with him; he grabbed Danny's arms and yanked him away, holding him up so his feet couldn't touch the ground.

Danny charged both hands with ectoplasm and aimed them at Phantom's face, but suddenly the grip on his arms became crushing. Danny was sure his bones would snap any second as he grimaced, hissing in pain. He was startled when Phantom electrocuted him with his hands, and he cried out, going limp.

"Now, let's see what a close-range Wail does to you," Phantom said.

* * *

Vlad honestly wasn't expecting the utter fury in Phantom's eyes. He didn't know exactly what he had been expecting, but it wasn't anything he couldn't handle. "Daniel—"

"How many times did I try to tell you?" roared the ghost, grabbing Vlad's wrists. "How many times-?" He forced himself back, throwing Vlad hard against the wall as he drew himself off the ghostly spikes he had been impaled on.

"This is for your own good," Vlad gasped. The ghost was surely still weak; he had only to transform to defeat him. But Danny's ghost half was fast and upon him in an instant.

* * *

Danny looked up as Phantom drew a deep breath. A close-range Wail probably wouldn't kill him, but the damage it would do … Danny would never be able to fight back.

He drew a deep breath as well, his throat burning, and screamed at the same time as his future self.

* * *

Danny dove down on Vlad, hurt and furious about it. His grief, his sadness – it was all barely a pinprick in his side compared to his anger.

How dare Vlad do this to him?

He yanked the gloves off of Vlad violently, intending to return the favor.

* * *

The sound waves of identical Ghostly Wails slammed into each other and bounced back, a shockwave of power shooting off like razors of wind. The pavement split, the windows on buildings shattered, the ground shook.

Danny screamed for all he was worth, focused entirely on beating back Phantom's matching Wail. But he wasn't as strong; he could feel his breath starting to weaken.

He was struck full in the face with the last of Phantom's Wail. Phantom released him at the same time, and he was flung back into the side of FentonWorks.

He fell to the ground, barely conscious.

* * *

Danny fastened the gloves over his arms, turning to the somewhat dazed Vlad. "You think this was a good idea? How about feeling it for yourself?"

He impaled the man on his own weapons, and Vlad shouted in pain. "Daniel-!"

"It's _Phantom_ to you!" He tore the gloves in opposite directions and found himself faced with a separated, shocked Vlad Plasmius.

* * *

Danny fought back the transformation back to Danny Fenton by the skin of his teeth. Phantom was approaching; his shadow fell over Danny.

"Hah! Still so weak," Phantom mocked.

Danny coughed, shaking slightly on his hands and knees and trying to hide the fact he was slowly drawing in another breath. If he'd learned anything from his first fight with Phantom, it was that he could win if he caught the ghost by surprise.

Phantom leaned over Danny, reaching for his suit, and Danny lifted his head and Wailed right into the ghost's face.

* * *

Phantom knew he wasn't strong enough to defeat Plasmius face to face at the moment, even though the other ghost was also dripping ectoplasm from his inflicted wounds. But maybe if he overshadowed Plasmius … destroyed him from the inside-!

From the corner of his eye he saw a flash of movement. Distracted, he turned his head to see his human half still strapped to the table, shaking his head frantically. He gasped soundlessly, the word "No!" formed on his lips.

_I promised._

Phantom hesitated, the thought stopping him cold. He felt his senses return.

Plasmius took the opportunity to blast him into a wall. "What have you done?" he demanded, flying up over Phantom and releasing another ecto-blast.

Phantom almost lost it again at that, fury choking him, but he caught himself and instinctively formed a dome shield to protect himself from the blasts flying his way. "You tell me!" he shot back. "It's your darn invention!" But his voice cracked; he was hurting. Phantom clutched his chest, feeling the ectoplasm bubbling out of his spectral form. He had the energy for maybe one more attack; he could try to overshadow Plasmius, or hit him with a Ghostly Wail. The Wail would probably make him lose so much strength that he would wink out of existence; he had lost the fallback of transforming into Danny Fenton.

_Better not to exist than to turn into that monster._ Hadn't he told Fenton he would rather be locked in a Thermos than risk becoming Phantom-Plasmius?

He had _promised._

Phantom made his decision.

He drew in a sharp breath and screamed.

* * *

_Of all the days for the Fentons to not be home!_ Sam thought furiously, digging through the junk and weapons in the basement lab of FentonWorks in search of the last remaining Fenton Thermos.

Tucker was with her, having grabbed Sam and run at Danny's request. "You know," he panted, "Phantom seems different. I mean, yeah, he's still big, bad, and evil, but he's not the _same_ big, bad, and evil, you know?"

Sam felt her heart clench painfully. The short conversation she'd had with Phantom had been intensely revealing. "It's Phantom," she said. "The alternate timeline Danny. He did turn into Phantom-Plasmius," she answered.

Tucker stared at her for a moment before moaning, "Oh, man! When I said he should visit I didn't mean it like this!"

Sam wasn't listening. "Here!" she cried triumphantly, holding up the Fenton Thermos to Tucker. "Let's get out of here!"

They started up the stairs, only to stumble when the ground shook and a painful, loud ghostly cry pierced their ears. Both Sam and Tucker clamped their hands over their ears, grimacing.

The moment it had faded they looked at each other.

"Danny!"

* * *

Phantom was startled when Danny Wailed right in his face. The force of it was enough to send him flying back, unable to right himself or fight back even when he slammed into the building on the opposite side of the street, a roar of pain escaping him when he felt as if he was being crushed against the brick behind him.

Finally, slowly, the force of the Wail weakened, then faded entirely. Phantom slid down the wall, stiff and weakened …

But not as weakened as his younger self, who had collapsed facedown on the pavement, transforming back into Danny Fenton. Phantom grinned, ignoring the ectoplasm dripping from his own nose. He had all but won.

Then he stiffened, looking up, his eyes unfocused.

Something was _wrong._

* * *

The Wail slammed Plasmius into the wall of the lab and kept him there, grunting with pain. Phantom didn't stop screaming for all he was worth, using his one advantage over Plasmius without shame.

The sensation of fragmentation didn't begin until he started to wind down, utterly exhausted. He slumped to the ground, and Plasmius fell to the floor, clearly struggling to recover.

He couldn't have overshadowed Plasmius if he wanted to.

Shaking, unsure if his form was tangible or not, Phantom looked towards his human half. His human half stared back with wide, frightened eyes.

_Hey, don't look like that, _Phantom thought. _I … we … did it. And whatever happens … we're keeping our promise._

The world cracked in his vision, and shattered.

"_Time out!"_

* * *

Danny woke up to Tucker shaking his shoulder violently. "Danny! Wake up!"

Danny groaned aloud in response, his entire body one big bruise, it seemed. His throat hurt so badly he could barely speak. "Ph-Phantom … where …?"

"He's right over there," Sam pointed, and Danny followed her finger to find himself staring at a very dazed-looking Phantom.

"He just stopped moving a second ago," Tucker said. "We got out of the house and he just … stopped moving."

Danny coughed roughly into his hand, and hid it abruptly when he saw blood on his palm. "W-well, what are we waiting for?" he asked, forcing a grin. "Suck him up!"

"Right on it, Danny," Sam confirmed, uncapping the Thermos.

But she froze when Phantom suddenly made a horrible, inhuman sound. "Ah-aaaaah!" The ghost clutched his head, bending over; he looked as if he was trying to split in two, but not quite succeeding.

Tucker's hand on Danny's shoulder got tighter and tighter as Phantom arched his back, and his chest seemed to tear open horrifically. A violent transformation was occurring; that was all Danny could tell.

As if he was flung free, a smaller, thinner, and more lanky ghost was suddenly tearing apart from a transforming Phantom, and Phantom collapsed, his form starting to dissolve into ectoplasm. The ghost collapsed instantly. Sam was the first to recognize him. "That's Danny!" And so it was; white-haired, wearing the same hazmat suit, but taller, the ghost was clearly Danny Phantom.

Beside him, the form of Phantom-Plasmius dissolved into merely Plasmius.

And then, both forms began to blur.

"_Time out!"_

* * *

"Daniel." The voice was gentle, but it echoed, ghostlike. Danny faintly recalled it as that of Clockwork, and he gradually opened his eyes, a pounding headache having settled in the back of his head.

"Yeah?" he asked softly, getting first to his hands and knees then sitting up. "What happened …?"

He was in Clockwork's lair; a medallion rested around his neck, which rather surprised him. The last thing he remembered was seeing his ghost half starting to fade away into nothingness, having not combined with Vlad; he felt a pang of loss even as he looked up at the Master of Time. He would never be able to 'go ghost' again. _ But it was worth it, _he thought. _Better than getting killed by Phantom-Plasmius …_

Clockwork floated over him, interrupting his thoughts. "Hello, Daniel." He smiled. "Congratulations."

Danny licked his lips. "F-for what? And why am I wearing a medallion …? Do I really need one here?"

"You would need one everywhere in the universe at the moment," Clockwork answered. He offered a hand and Danny took it, allowing himself to be pulled to his feet. "It was necessary to freeze time on such a great scale because I have done something I very rarely do: I have frozen time on the cusp of a remerging alternate timeline."

Danny blinked. "A what?" he asked. "I mean, sorry, but I have a huge headache, so small words would be really appreciated right now."

Clockwork chuckled. "Allow me to show you." He pointed his staff at a portal, and Danny looked that way to see a frozen Danny with his two frozen friends, staring at two blurring bodies in the middle of the street in front of a damaged FentonWorks. "Do you see those two figures in the street?"

Danny squinted at the blurred figures. "Yeah. I can't … is that … that looks kind of like me. And that looks like Plasmius," he said slowly.

"Correct." Clockwork seemed pleased. "They were once locked up in this Fenton Thermos." He produced from his cloak the beaten Fenton Thermos that had rested in the antechamber for the last several weeks.

"Wait. Do you mean … they were my future self?" Danny asked incredulously.

Clockwork nodded. "Precisely. But there is no evil future self now, Daniel. There never was one. You never became him – just as I told you."

Danny clutched his head. "So – wait. What …?"

Clockwork shook his head. "Don't think too hard about it, Daniel – you're only fourteen, after all. You made the right decision; you never let your Phantom self attempt to overshadow Plasmius."

"Well, that was my ghost half. You should be thanking him," Danny mumbled. "All I did was lay there."

The Master of Time chuckled. "You _are_ your ghost half, Danny. 'He' is just another part of you. But enough of that. I brought you here to give you a few answers, and we only have as long as I can keep Time frozen, which I cannot do indefinitely.

"Your timeline, as I told you, was the effect of my meddling with Time itself – namely, my setting it back two hours. If I had not set back Time two hours, there would have been only one timeline, but in it, your parents would have never accepted you as a ghost. I cannot see very far down that path, since it's a path that was never taken.

"However, I did set back Time, which eliminated most of the harm done by Phantom, but none of the good. You see, his revelation of himself to Jasmine prompted her to lead you to the Plasmius Portal, which in turn caused you to discover how the evil Phantom came to be. You had to have that knowledge – and without the Plasmius Portal, you never could have returned to defeat Phantom and put him in the Fenton Thermos.

"Nonetheless, by setting back time and erasing the damage done by Phantom, I also created an alternate timeline that continued as if I had never stepped in. This also resulted in Phantom being forced out of the True Timeline. To prevent him from wreaking further havoc, I kept him locked here in the Thermos.

"As you know, Time progressed in both Timelines. I did not interfere, except to send you to the True Timeline for some … healing, shall we say." Clockwork chuckled. "That sort of meddling bears no consequences.

"But as the time drew near for you to become Phantom-Plasmius – should you so choose – Phantom escaped his prison. I allowed him to do so." Clockwork held up a hand to stave off the protest. "He had to be present in some Timeline to allow him to split. Here, time's resetting of itself would have had no effect – just as it will have no effect in the next few seconds.

"You see, the existence of the Evil Phantom – and therefore, his younger self – was the only pin keeping the timelines separate. And now that Phantom-Plasmius never exists … your reality is crumbling, fading away, to be absorbed into the True Timeline."

Danny tried to wrap his mind around this. "Wait a minute. If my evil self never existed, then who threw me into the Ghost Zone so I found out how to stop myself from _becoming_ evil?"

Clockwork smiled. "Ah, you see, that is the beauty of alternate timelines, and why they exist. Everything that happens in them is completely valid, Daniel. They are without consequence because they aren't eternal." His smile seemed tinged with sadness for a moment.

Danny sighed. It didn't really make sense, but if Clockwork had gone through all the trouble of stopping the whole universe to explain things, he wasn't going to disillusion the ghost. "Uh … so why are the parts of Phantom all blurred out like that?" he asked.

"Because they do not belong in that part of the Timeline," Clockwork answered. "And explaining how Time is straightening that wrinkle out will merely make your eyes glaze over." He paused. "I cannot keep Time stopped much longer. Did you have any other questions?"

The hybrid hesitated visibly. He was reluctant to ask this, since he wasn't sure he wanted to know. "Uh … does this mean I'm about to not exist?"

Clockwork gazed at him evenly. "In a manner of speaking, you may think that," Clockwork answered. "Or you might think of it this way: you are remerging with the 'real' you." He grinned. "Do you think I would really take the time to explain myself to someone who is about to disappear forever?"

"Uh, you didn't take _any _time to do it," Danny pointed out. "You _stopped _time."

Clockwork chuckled. "So I did." He approached Danny. "Well, you have another decision to make. I have no control over you as long as you're wearing that medallion. When you take it off, you will freeze along with the rest of the world; I will send you back to the last seconds of your Timeline, and Time will continue. Or you could allow me to meddle – or perhaps meddle yourself – by leaving that medallion on, and allowing yourself to exist as you are." He crossed his arms over his chest. "What do you choose, Daniel?"

Danny drew a deep breath and let it out, his gaze going to the Danny in the 'real' timeline. He was bruised and battered, but Sam was standing in front of him, and Tucker was beside him.

He envied that Danny. And all he had to do to 'become' him was take off the medallion on his neck.

"I just want to be with my friends … with my family." He smiled crookedly. "If it was hard losing my family and friends, how hard will it be to lose my whole timeline?"

Danny was done with loss. He flung the medallion to the ground, and finally, after three weeks of torture, there was peace.

* * *

Clockwork smiled slightly as Danny tore off the medallion around his neck and promptly froze in place. "Goodbye, Daniel," he said softly, pressing a button on his staff that sent Danny back to his restraints in Vladimir's lab.

He would miss the boy from the alternate timeline.

The Master of Time turned towards the portals that he had guarded and would guard for as long as Time existed.

"So long, Daniel. I'll see you sooner than you think.

_Time in."_

_Clockwork knows, has known, and always will know that Time is meant to bend, and he watches (will watch, watched) as Time itself fusse back together, knit as if it was never separate._

_In one timeline, the only timeline, Daniel wakes (will wake, awoke) feeling battered but refreshed, and oddly sad._

_And Time marches on._

fin


	8. Epilogue: Dreamers

_Since the ending of the story was so confusing, hopefully Tucker can help clear things up for you a bit. Here's a little extra bit for you, and for convenience, we'll call it an epilogue:_

**Epilogue: Dreamers**

Danny would later learn he was the only one who perceived the warping of time, a stretch, almost, as if Clockwork had not properly frozen things, but rather slowed it down. Sam and Tucker moved as if through molasses. Phantom and Plasmius both snapped out of existence, and then, with a roar, a black hole descended on him.

When he woke up, he was laying on his bed. He felt oddly depressed, and at the same time, relieved.

"Danny? You awake?" Tucker asked, looking up from his PDA.

The wave of affection Danny felt for his best friend was all out of proportion, but it didn't stop Danny from sitting up sharply. "Tucker!"

"What? Is something on my face?" the bewildered boy patted his cheeks.

"I … I'm just so glad to see you," Danny said. He blinked. "I don't know why."

"Well, I'm glad to see you awake," Sam remarked from the doorway, walking in, and Danny felt another rush of happiness. "Your sister's gonna get home soon. We did what we could with you, but if your ghost healing doesn't kick in and—oomph!" She coughed as Danny threw his arms around her waist, hugging her from the bed. "What?"

"Danny's happy to see us. He doesn't know why," Tucker explained. He rolled his eyes.

Danny sat back on the bed, letting out a little pleased breath. "What Tucker said. I'm glad Phantom didn't hurt you." He hesitated. "Wait. What happened there at the end? I remember Phantom kind of … I dunno .. having …?"

"Death throes?" Tucker interrupted. "Yeah. Well, I've done a little research—"

"By which he means 'read through Danny's Spider-Man Clone Wars comic books'," Sam interjected smoothly.

Tucker glared at her. "—And the best I can figure is something happened in the alternate universe that disrupted Phantom's existence."

Danny blinked. "Okay, so why do I still remember fighting him? Shouldn't everything be totally different now, since Phantom never existed?"

"Not necessarily. Because even though he ceased to exist in his _own_ universe, everything he did in _our_ universe still happened, since it's not the same universe," Tucker explained. "Comic book physics. You should pay more attention to your collection, Danny."

"Thanks for the advice, Tuck, I'll keep that in mind," Danny snorted. "Although, the explanation helps. Sort of."

"Glad to be of service," Tucker answered proudly. "You owe me a smoothie for the trouble."

"For reading _my_ comic books?" Danny rolled his eyes, crossing his arms. "But … I'll buy you one anyway. And you too, Sam."

"What's the occasion?" Sam asked, raising an eyebrow. "Other than, you know, surviving your evil alter ego? Again!"

"Nothing." Danny shrugged. "Just … I feel like I've been missing you guys for ages." He shook his head slightly. "And while I really could just go for continuing my nap right now, I think I could really go for a smoothie tomorrow."

"You're acting a little weird, Danny," Sam confessed.

Danny nodded. "I know. I can't help it, though." He met her eyes.

Sam blinked.

"Huh," she said quietly, breaking her gaze away.

* * *

What Sam didn't say, and never did say, even when Danny went back to his normal, not-clingy self, was that she saw Phantom in his eyes.

He wouldn't understand.

Clockwork, however, might have.

_ende_

_Thank you again to everyone who read and reviewed this story! It was truely a pleasure to write. I look forward to seeing all of you around_


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